The Devil's Dilemma
by Her Alter-Ego
Summary: One woman, two men. One, a Hero--the other, a Demon. Life as a teenage father isn't easy, Harry discovers. It's about to get a whole lot worse when his daughter is kidnapped and he discovers that his wife is in love with the unlikeliest of men.
1. Default Chapter

**__**

Prologue:

Harry peered into the bassinet and into the eyes of his tiny newborn daughter, Abigail Rose, or, as Sirius had nicknamed her for some unexplained reason, Abbey Road. He watched as the infant's crying ceased abruptly and her large blue eyes crossed for a fraction of a second as she worked to bring her daddy into view. Harry smiled tenderly at her as he reached into the bassinet to pick her up.

"How's my little girl tonight, huh?" he asked her in a soft, reassuring voice. "Someone's hungry and can't wait until morning?" He placed the baby against his bare chest and rubbed her tiny back with a slow circular motion. He sighed as she snuggled against him, her head resting in the crook of his neck as she molded her body to his in a way that only newborns can do.

Despite the fact that Abigail had occupied the nursery for nearly three weeks, Harry still marveled at how light and soft she was. Barely seven pounds now, Abigail was just a bit heavier than a Quaffle. She had an untidy mop of black hair, pink cheeks and rosebud lips that Harry forever felt the need to kiss. Her shoulders and back was still covered in the soft, downy hair-like substance that all babies were born with, making her seem that much more vulnerable. When she cried, his heart ached. When she was sleeping comfortably in his arms he felt more at peace with the world than he could imagine. He was to be the shaper of her dreams; the molder of her future; the one who would teach her right and wrong and the beater of potential boyfriends with a sharp stick.

"You're not going to have _any _boyfriends, are you, Abigail?" he asked. "You're going to stay here with me forever. I'm going to teach you about Quidditch and Fizzing Whizbees and why Professor Snape is a poncy git. You're not going to have time for pesky boys!" He lowered his head a bit and smelled her hair as he kissed the little swirl on the crown of her head. She smelled sweetly of baby shampoo and softness and sour milk "You're going to be daddy's little girl, right?"

Abigail said nothing.

Harry sat down in the large rocking chair next to the bassinet and picked up her bottle of formula. He adjusted Abigail's position a bit, so that her head was in the crook of his arm, her face to his. He placed the nipple of the bottle to the baby's lower lip and she eagerly began to suck. As he rocked her, the only sounds that were heard were the creak of the rocker and the sound of air bubbles in the bottle. Abigail's eyes were still trained on her father.

"I'm going to be a good daddy to you, Abigail. People say it can't be done; that I'm too young and immature to know what love really is. They say that your mummy and I made a huge mistake in making you and it's only a matter of time before we fail you. I promise I'm not going to let that happen, Abigail. As God as my witness, I'm going to do right by you and your mum." Harry continued to rock the little girl. Little by little his eyes began to feel very heavy. Soon, father and child were sound asleep in the rocking chair and all was at peace in the world…at least for the moment.

**__**

"The Devil's Dilemma"

Chapter One

"Wormtail in Wonderland"

Gather 'round my friends and let me weave you a tale,

A tale of romance and suspense--

A story of intrigue, of terror and betrayal,

And a plot twist to that's frankly-- intense!

A husband, a wife and their newborn daughter

Add a suitor who's not on the level…

And all of a sudden you have the ingredients,

For the tale of a Dilemma and a Devil…

-"One Woman, Two Men…" original poem by webba –

Business at the Wonderland Bar and Gentleman's Club (a Muggle establishment) was unusually slow for a Friday night. Despite the lousy weather and lack of a major sporting event on the television (factors which usually boded well for the prosperity of the establishment on any given night), the bar was very nearly empty. Those who depended on the male clientele for their paychecks were becoming worried at the lack of prospects.

"It looks like it's going to be slow tonight, Melissa," a lanky blond commented as she tugged at her turquoise midriff top with one hand.

"Always the way, Monique! You know, the nights I really need some good money it's always dead in here! My bloody landlord is threatening to change the locks on my flat if I don't pay the rent by the first," a brunette with brown doe eyes said in an exasperated voice. "Hey, what about him?" she asked, pointing to a small man sitting in a corner booth. "I didn't notice him sitting there before. He looks so sad…perhaps he needs cheering up!" She sat up a little straighter in her seat, hoping to get a better look at the potential prospect.

Monique followed Melissa's finger with her gaze and soon saw the man she was referring to. The man was quite short--not even five feet five inches tall, she suspected, and balding. He wore a slightly grubby light blue corduroy jacket and the most disconsolate expression she had ever seen. However, Monique knew the man well. When he was in a jovial mood, he could be quite an enjoyable trick to turn; but lately, he had been cruel and callous…and not to mention a little off in the head.

For one thing, he refused to take off his shirt during sex. Monique had learned not to question his motives behind that particular quirk the hard way: she once asked the obvious question and consequently was ravaged savagely by the man to the point where she was out of commission for three days! Wonderland's proprietor had suggested a lifetime ban, but the majority of the girls rejected the idea out of pure greed. This rather strange man paid too well to be expelled, in their opinion, and was, after all, a self-proclaimed war veteran. That fact would certainly explain his propensity for violent outbursts! The girls had certainly seen similar behaviors in other men and, after all, it had only happened the one time. Monique was not as willing to forgive and forget, as the other girls were wont to do: after all, it had been she that the man had attacked. Therefore, she was less than thrilled to see him back in the bar. "Oh, God, not _him,_" Monique moaned as she smacked her forehead in anguish. "He's such a sleazy little rat-faced bastard!"

"I don't know about that," Melissa commented as she picked up her vodka and orange and downed it in rapid fashion. "Seems to me that, depending on whether or not you catch him in a good mood, he's rather a nice diversion from the rest of the tossers we usually get in here!" The vivacious brunette adjusted the strap on her tight-fitting silver sequined halter-top. "He pays extremely well, too, for the amount of time he's actually…you know…getting closer to God, so to speak!" She uncrossed her legs. "As far as customers go, he's one hell of a kisser!"

The girls around Melissa cupped their hands over their mouths and giggled knowingly. At one time or another, each and every one of them had had the experience of conducting business with "The Little Worm," as they referred to him.

"That's not in dispute! But, to be honest, the man creeps me out! He loves to role-play and some of his scenarios are rather bizarre," Monique said pointedly. "The last time I had the _pleasure_ of entertaining him, he kept asking me, 'Who's your Dark Lord?' and wanting me to spank him! Honestly, it was weird… and don't get me started on that metal hand of his!"

The girls collapsed into raucous laughter at this statement. That metal hand was COLD! Still, according to the customer anyway, the prosthetic device was a souvenir of the 1991 altercation with Iraq and no one could make fun of _that_, at least to his face. He had done his duty for God and Country and a person had to admire that! Still, it didn't make the sensation of his metal fingers caressing their bodies any less strange.

Melissa pulled a lipstick out of her pocket and swiped some across her lips. "Then you don't mind if I go and strike up a conversation, then? I've got to pay the rent and my kid needs a new pair of shoes. Perhaps 'The Little Worm' is in a friendly type mood! Although," she added with a knowing smile, "we all know that there's not much that's "little" about him!" The girls seated around her nodded meaningfully.

"Go for it. Just don't ever say I didn't warn you," Monique answered in a dismissive voice as she scanned the crowd for a more pleasing prospect.

Melissa gave her friend a wink and a nod. "Warning noted, mate! Hey now, gals, watch and learn, 'cause there ain't a trick that I can't turn!" Melissa's seatmates tittered with laughter while Monique rolled her eyes and sighed.

Melissa shook her head at her picky co-worker as she stepped off her high barstool and sauntered through the crowd, her target clearly in her sights. Money was money, in her opinion; as long as the weirdo wasn't going to beat her up too badly, it was rather an easy way to keep her daughter in clothes. "The Little Worm" was sitting by himself in a corner of the bar nursing a bottle of Heineken. As she approached his table, he looked up and she gave him a thousand-watt smile as she winked suggestively at him. She leaned over the table and allowed the man a very nice look at her cleavage. As she gestured to the empty seat next to him, she said in a rather seductive voice, "Room for me, Wormie?"

"Not tonight, Melissa," Peter said in a flat voice. "I'm not feeling up to it." He went back to staring at his bottle of beer, his eyes downcast.

Melissa sat down anyway. "Poor little soldier," she purred in his ear, running fingers from one hand through his thin hair and placing a kiss on his cheek. "You look like you just lost your best friend, sweetie!"

"Like you c--care," Peter retorted without looking at her directly. He picked up his beer and took a large swig. He held the bottle up to the light and examined the contents: it was now practically empty and had only the tiniest dribble left. He slid it across the table, where it chinked against the other four bottles he had emptied in the last half-hour, two of went crashing to the floor. He regarded his curvaceous seatmate with the glassy expression of someone who had perhaps imbibed more than he should have in such a short amount of time. "Do you get paid to m--merely sit around and g--goldbrick?" he asked peevishly. "You _c--could_ make yourself useful, Melissa, and g--get me another drink."

"Ooh," pouted Melissa, batting her eyelashes at Peter in a coquettish manner, "someone's in a bad mood!" She placed her left hand on his upper thigh. "You're too tense, Wormie. Why don't you and I go and blow off some steam?" she suggested, the hand on his inner thigh inching slowly upward until she found her intended target. "Hmmm?"

"I said _NOT TONIGHT_!" barked Peter, slapping her hand away.

Melissa sighed. The man was not feeling at all frisky tonight. Unless she could somehow cheer him up, it looked like her little girl would have to wait on those shoes after all. Any other prostitute might have given up at this point, but Melissa didn't know the meaning of failure. She was a woman who regularly got what she wanted and she was the first to admit that she liked a challenge. Her challenge tonight was a certain "Worm".

She raised one hand in the air and snapped her fingers. "Who do I have to kill to get a drink around here?" she called to the barman, who tossed her an unopened bottle of the swill. "Thanks, mate!" Melissa caught the bottle with an oft-practiced motion just before the projectile would have struck Peter squarely in the head. Peter, who did not drink very often and had become rather soused and bleary-eyed, was barely aware that he had been in any danger. He continued to mope. A dead rabbit lying on the side of the road on Easter morning would have been a cheerier sight.

"What's the matter?" asked Melissa, her bow of a mouth fixed in a frown. "Did you lose your girl or something?" She held up the bottle of Heineken and dangled it provocatively before his eyes.

"You m--might say that," Peter answered. He reached up to take the bottle from the woman. Before his fingers could wrap around the bottle, however, she pulled her tight shirt away from her body and placed the bottle inside it. It rested in an area that was going to be extremely difficult for Peter to gain access to without being completely obscene.

"Melissa," he said in a warning tone of voice, "Give me my bloody bottle n—n—now!"

"Come and get it, soldier!" The prostitute said with a shiver. Because of the temperature of the bottle, her skin had begun to break out in goose pimples; due to the extreme tightness of Melissa's top, it wasn't just her arms that were responding to the chill. Despite his low-spirited mood, Peter _was _impressed with the Melissa's tenacity and various other attributes. His eyes strayed from her face for a second or two.

"So, why did you lose your girl?" she asked as she rubbed his back with one hand. "Did you have a row with her?"

If only it were that easy. "She wouldn't leave her h--husband," he said sulkily. "I was s--so much better for her, but she didn't see it that way." He rubbed his eyes. "She meant everything to me."

"Girl didn't know what a good thing she had, if you ask me," said Melissa as she swung her legs into Wormtail's lap. "You're the perfect man, Wormie. All the girls here say so." She threw her hands into the air as she said this, emphasizing her point.

Wormtail placed one arm around Melissa's waist and pulled her into his lap so that she was straddling him. She wrapped her arms around his neck. He inclined his head in the direction of the lanky blond sitting next to the seat Melissa had occupied earlier. The woman wore a scowl on her face and jiggled one foot against her stool impatiently. Wormtail deduced that she was becoming irritated at the lack of prospects this evening. He knew her well; she disliked him intensely! "Even Monique?" Wormtail asked pointedly. "I don't think she l--likes me much!"

"Monique doesn't see you like I do, lover," she voiced. She giggled when Wormtail placed his human hand underneath her top and proceeded to search very slowly and methodically for the wayward bottle. His fingers lingered against her bare skin. Melissa kissed Peter softly. "So tell me, Wormie. What was she like?"

Peter sighed as his mind conjured up the image of the woman he loved: not too thin, not too chubby--the kind of woman that curved in all the right places, yet was solid enough so that you didn't think that by hugging her you might break her in half. Tessa was a bit taller than Peter normally liked his women (he was very short and didn't normally like women who towered over him, which ruled out a large segment of the female populous) but he didn't hold that against her. She had shoulder-length brown hair, eyes as blue as the midnight sky and a mouth that was perhaps too broad for her face, yet endearing just the same. She was not pretty in the sense that a supermodel was pretty: rather, her sense of humor, caring nature and ability to see the good in nearly everyone was her true beauty. She was the type of woman that caused Peter to fall to his knees and thank God that he was a man! However, because of what Peter had put her though over the past year, he knew that the woman hated him with a raw passion and always would.

"Tessa was amazing…_is _amazing. She's s--stubborn and feisty and funny and an excellent c—cook and…" he trailed off, "hopelessly in l--love with her h--husband." He held up the bottle and Melissa opened it for him by balancing the cap on the edge of the table and sweeping her hand sharply down. Peter downed it completely in a matter of seconds.

"Too bad," Melissa said, playing with a long strand of Peter's straw-colored hair. "Well, you know what they say, soldier. If you love someone, set her free. If she comes back to you, she's yours; but if she doesn't, she was never yours to begin with."

"You don't understand, Melissa!" Peter said, his voice rising quite a lot. "I—I can't stop thinking about h--her. She was the b--best thing that ever happened to m--me!"

"I'd say she was a grade-A arse, soldier, if she didn't want you!"

Peter's face became scarlet with anger. "**DON'T YOU _EVER _CALL TESSA POTTER AN ARSE**!" Peter shouted, shoving Melissa away roughly. She landed on the floor just outside the booth.

Melissa got up slowly, rubbing her backside as she did so. The establishment had grown remarkably silent--all eyes were focused on the little man and his companion. Wonderland's proprietor stuck his head out of his office to see what all the commotion was about. He flashed the hooker a questioning glance, which Melissa shrugged off.

"I'm sorry, Wormie," she said in a syrupy voice. "I'll go away now, if you want me to. I just saw that you looked really sad and I thought maybe I could help you forget about her, at least for awhile." She began to walk away, her round hips swaying temptingly. The music blared once again and the other customers turned their heads away and became focused once again on their various conversations and dealings.

As Peter watched Melissa sashay toward another prospect, he suddenly had a thought: Melissa wasn't exactly painful to look at. She was also a decent shag, and a willing one at that (admittedly for pay, but at this point he wasn't a man with a lot to lose in the way of dignity), and perhaps could indeed help him to forget the woman he truly longed for. Better yet…

"Melissa!" he cried. The girl turned around, her eyes wide and her smile wider.

"Yes?"

"I have a proposition for you." Peter beckoned her back to the table and patted the seat next to him. She rejoined him eagerly.

"What can I do for you tonight?" she asked, running a hand through her hair.

"I want you tonight, Melissa. How long are you available?"

"You've got me for the whole night if you want me, soldier!" said Melissa, mentally adding up the tab on eight hours' work.

"I will be r--requiring certain things for this night to p--proceed as I see fit," he said. "Can I call you Tessa?"

"If you've got the means, you can call me anything you want, Wormie!"

"Excellent. How much for the night?"

"It's going to be a big bill, Wormie. I won't have time to service anyone else, you know!" She paused, almost afraid to tell him what the charge would be. "Five hundred and fifty pounds."

Wormtail pulled eight hundred pounds out of the pocket of his Muggle jacket. He waved the money underneath a very surprised Melissa's nose, who was now thinking that not only would the Landlord get his rent, her kid would also have shoes and perhaps a new coat and some jeans to boot!

"Will this cover it?" Wormtail asked. He had no real concept of Muggle currency: to him it was just a bunch of paper notes with pictures of the Queen on them. He found the portraits to be quite amusing, as they did not move.

"Y--yes, soldier, that will cover the night in spades," the prostitute breathed. What kind of woman wouldn't want a man who had this kind of money to burn? She thought. She turned to her group of co-workers who were sitting at the bar and staring at Melissa with dropped jaws. Despite being thrown on her arse, they thought as one, she was going to turn her trick after all!

Wormtail reached back into the pocket of the Muggle jacket he wore. He pulled out a piece of black diaphanous material. He placed the item to his nose and inhaled deeply. Ah, he thought, her scent still lingers…just a hint of jasmine. That was Tessa's signature fragrance. With great reverence, he placed the treasure into Melissa's outstretched hand. She shook out the carefully folded item and discovered that it was a very lovely, very expensive piece of lingerie. Where would "The Worm" have come across such a beautiful item?

"Will you w--wear this for me?" Peter asked.

"I'll wear _anything _for you, you sexy stud!" Melissa kissed him deeply, her tongue searching out his. He responded eagerly, his anticipation of seeing someone wearing the lingerie he had stolen from Tessa's chest of drawers causing his arousal to spike to record levels. If he closed his eyes, it would be almost as if he really _were _making love to Tessa.

Peter broke the kiss. He grinned cryptically at Melissa, who, for the first time in her esteemed career, began to feel a little bit of anxiety. The man's smile was strange and didn't look entirely like that of a sane man, she thought. She pushed the feeling out of her mind with a slight shake of her head. She was going to make eight hundred pounds for just eight hours' work! _That_ would teach Monique never to speak ill of the customers, she thought with a feeling of superiority.

"It's settled then," he intoned. Wormtail looked up to the bartender and raised his index finger in the air.

"Check, please!"

Lord Voldemort was deeply incensed: things were not going according to his ultimate design at all. He had been looking to rid the planet of the wizarding world's Golden Boy, Harry Potter, for years. Harry Potter was everything Voldemort was not: noble, honorable and an all-round do-gooder. His skill in defending the wizarding world, and all those who were staunch supporters of the Side of the Good, was truly legendary: there wasn't a wizard or witch alive who could boast the awesome powers he seemed to possess in the face of danger. Some in the wizarding world wondered where their lives might be if it were not for the young man, of which Voldemort was painfully aware. He was reminded of it each and every time he had faced his pubescent nemesis and emerged the loser; as long as Harry Potter remained alive, those who supported Good had very little to fear.

Voldemort often pondered what method he would have to employ to bring down Potter once and for all. He decided, rather sadistically, that playing on Harry's kindness and trusting nature would be the most effective route to take in accomplishing the boy wizard's undoing. The quandary was how to go about doing it. Harry was well protected while he was at his Aunt and Uncle's house and while he was at Hogwarts. As long as Harry was in the vicinity of both places, it seemed as though nothing bad could touch him.

As Voldemort pondered this point, an idea hit him like a brick to the head. There just might be a way to kill Potter after all! The idea was fiendishly simple: somehow get Harry out of Hogwarts, away from those who could protect him; then kill him, clean and quick. Then Voldemort would be free to wreak havoc on the wizarding world and those who supported tolerance and understanding.

The original idea had been simple enough, really. Any _child _should have been able to pull the plan off, he thought with a sneer: Peter Pettigrew and two of the Dark Lord's best Death Eaters were instructed to kidnap Michael and Sierra Laughlin, arguably the two best Aurors ever employed by the Ministry of Magic. The Laughlin's were to be held in Voldemort's dungeons until their twenty-eight year old daughter, Tessa, could pay their ransom. The "ransom" that Tessa would be required to pay was, in not so many words, twisted and perverse. It amounted to no less than a "Devil's Deal"; a deal that, even if successfully completed, would leave her "damned if she did and damned if she didn't". If she completed the deal, her parents were spared, but she would be seen as a traitor to the Side of the Good. If she failed to complete the deal, her parents would die and so would she.

Voldemort had long ago made it his business to understand how the human psyche worked, so it came as no surprise to him that Tessa would agree to the terms of his deal. She would be transformed by the Dark Lord into a sixteen-year old girl and forced to pose as an exchange student to gain access to Hogwarts and Harry. She was to seduce him out of the school and to a nearby glen, where she would deliver him to the Dark Lord.

Unfortunately for the Dark Lord, Tessa was a Ravenclaw by birth and clever as they come. She stole one of the legendary "Dumortierite Crystals" from Professor Trelawney's private stores and cast a spell upon it that would protect Harry from harm. By the time she arrived in the glen with Harry, she realized that, despite the huge age difference, she loved Harry deeply and gave herself to him completely. When the Dark Lord arrived to collect what he thought was rightfully his, Tessa reneged on the deal. This prompted Voldemort to summon Pettigrew; his second in command, and force him to murder her parents before her eyes. The Dark Lord instructed that Harry and Tessa be bound together and killed by the Death Eaters. However, the Dumortierite crystal, which had the power to repel spells thrown by large groups of those who wished someone ill, bounced the _Avada Kedavra _curses off the pair and back to the Death Eaters, killing several of them.

The Dark Lord paused in his immersion at this point and cursed aloud. The Laughlin bitch had proven herself a worthy adversary…nearly as resolute as Harry and quite powerful in her own right. Voldemort had misjudged the woman's skill, a mistake he would not make a second time…if indeed a second time should present itself to him.

In a stroke of luck for the Dark Lord, but unfortunately for the boy wizard and his paramour, Harry and Tessa's sexual union produced an unforeseen consequence: a pregnancy. As Voldemort guessed he would, Harry married Tessa to make an honest woman of her and Dumbledore hid the couple in a house far away.

Thinking that perhaps he could kidnap the child and use it as a bargaining chip for Harry, Voldemort instructed Peter Pettigrew to disguise himself as the charming Edward McMurray –the local handyman-- and to infiltrate the Potter's house and to gather information about the couple. Peter fell head over heels in love with Tessa and nearly destroyed the newlyweds' marriage because of his warped infatuation with the new Mrs. Potter.

Tessa gave birth early in June. Due to complications with the birth, she lost a lot of blood and would have surely died had Peter not rolled up his own sleeve and donated his blood to save her.

This last bit was what made Voldemort's blood boil the most: he had specifically instructed Wormtail to let the woman die. Tessa Potter was a hindrance to the Plan, he explained to the obsequious wizard, and had outlived her usefulness. However, his second in command now had _feelings _for the woman; unrequited, to be sure, but feelings nonetheless. Wormtail harbored the inane idea that Tessa might someday fall for him and leave Harry. Those feelings caused Wormtail to save Tessa's life.

With Tessa alive, the plan would be much harder to complete, thought Voldemort bitterly. Wormtail, being the insidious coward that he was, had failed to return to his Master's lair. No doubt the pathetic man is afraid of my wrath, Voldemort surmised. As well he should be. When I'm finished with him, he'll wish he had never been born! Voldemort's eyes were like two red flames as he thought of it. He'll be worse than dead.

If you were to peer over the gently rolling hills and through the trees surrounding the quiet, two-story house in the tiny village of Staplehurst, Kent, you would see nothing out of the ordinary. The off-white house with the weathered stone wall that surrounded it stood alone and unimpressive, a fledgling rose garden just outside the back door, and a gnarled old oak in the front garden. Truly, as houses and gardens go, the house was simply…normal.

It is often said that looks can be deceiving and, in the case of this particular house, a person would be correct in making such a declaration. As commonplace as the home may have been, the family who occupied it was extraordinary by contrast: this was the home of Harry and Tessa Potter and their brand-new baby daughter, Abigail Rose. To an ordinary Muggle, this information was also of little consequence, but to Those in the Know (and there were very few of these) the inhabitants of the house were truly remarkable. One had saved the wizarding world several times; one was on the run from the law, wanted for aiding the Side of Darkness; the third occupant was the couple's newborn daughter, barely three weeks old.

The milieu inside the Potter house was, in one word, chaotic. Despite the couple's fervent attempts to keep up with the chores around the house and the hardships that accompany a newborn child, they were only marginally successful. The baby was happy, but the house was a mess: dirty dishes filled the sink; dirty nappies filled the bin; dirty clothes filled the linen basket. Tessa was extremely weak and spent most of her time in bed or feeding Abigail. She was so weak that she could not perform the simplest charm. Harry's charms were nowhere near as good as Tessa's were and, as a result, the dishes merely piled up more, dirty nappies were placed in the large trash bin outside the back door (when Harry remembered to do it, of course) and Harry was wearing the same set of robes for the third straight day. None of this bothered Harry much; as long as he had his little girl, he could overlook any of the house's cosmetic imperfections!

"Are you certain that you're all right, Tessa?" Harry gazed at his wife lovingly. Every day since the morning that she had awakened from her coma, Harry wondered at how lucky he was to have two women in his life. Mother and infant were truly the center of his universe.

"I think I'm all right, Harry," Tessa answered her husband, with a small grimace of pain on her face. She struggled to sit in the beautiful large rocking chair that Dumbledore had given the couple some months ago. She held out her hands and awaited her baby.

"Here she is, all ready for mummy," Harry said lovingly as he gently placed the newborn in her mother's arms.

He still could not get over the fact that he was a father. Little Abigail had stolen his heart from the first time he saw her in the delivery room of the local hospital. Despite the pointed lecture his godfather Sirius had given to him weeks earlier about how terrible newborns looked, Harry could not fathom how _anyone _could have thought his daughter was less than beautiful. Ever since Tessa and the child had come home from the hospital, six days after Abigail had been born, Harry was reluctant to give the little girl to anyone else, preferring to hold her for hours and hours each day! However, he was sensible enough to realize that Abigail needed to be fed and Tessa would be required to hold her, at least for a while.

He bent over the figure of his little angel and placed a gentle kiss on her forehead. "I expect to have her back after the feeding, Mrs. Potter. She and I have a date with the newest copy of _Quidditch Affectionado_. We're reading about the new Nimbus 2003's." Harry placed his finger close to his daughter's hand so that she could grab it. He never tired of the feeling of her tiny fingers wrapping around his. "We love the new Nimbuses, don't we, Abbey? Can you say 'Nimbus?' NIM-BUS!"

Tessa flashed Harry an irritated scowl. "I'm not going to have any success getting her to latch on with you distracting her like that! Goodness knows it's hard enough!" She looked at her daughter lovingly as she stroked the baby's soft pink cheek. "Hello, little one," Tessa said as she pulled back her dressing gown to allow the infant access to one breast. Abigail latched on with a little help from her mother and soon was busy nursing.

Tessa stared down at her precious little girl. She secretly thought that the child was going to have the look of Harry--her black hair was already unruly and stuck out everywhere, despite Tessa's best efforts to smooth it down. She also had Harry's long slender fingers. "My daughter isn't going to play such a rough sport! Abigail will learn to play the piano, and perhaps the viola." Tessa smiled wickedly as she added, "I'm going to teach her my secrets of Scrabble success, so that I can have a competent challenger for a change." Upon saying this, her eyes darkened a bit as she remembered that at one time, not so long ago, she actually had _had _one. She banished the thought from her mind as quickly as it came and flashed Harry a cynical smile.

"That, my love, was a low blow!" Harry exclaimed. "I've gotten a lot better at that game. The last time we played, you only won by 150 points!" He rubbed his wife's shoulders and kissed her cheek. "When you're finished feeding her, why don't you give her to me and go for a nap?" Harry asked good-naturedly. "She keeps you up at night with the feedings and I've noticed you're not sleeping that well," he added with a slight frown. That was the understatement of the year, Harry thought. At a time when she should be trying to get as much sleep as she could, Tessa was doing everything in her power to prevent it! "Do you need more of those little pink pills the hospital gave you to help you with that?" he asked gently.

"I don't want pills. I'm okay, Harry, really I am," Tessa said in a too-cheerful voice that failed to betray the black circles under her eyes, "I don't need any more sleep!" She continued to gaze at her child, making little cooing and clucking noises at Abigail while the newborn concentrated on dinner. "Besides," she added, still looking at the tiny baby in her arms, "why would a person want to sleep when they have this beautiful little face to gaze at?" Tessa's voice broke slightly at the end of the sentence.

Harry kneeled before her and patted her outer thigh. "Tessa, we both know that you need your rest. You just had a baby, sweetheart. I can take care of Abigail while you sleep. She's going to be safe with me!" Harry tried to reassure her. He joked, "I'm not going to fly around the yard with her!"

Tessa was adamant. She looked up at Harry with tired red eyes filled with tears. "Don't worry about me," she snapped. Harry shook his head and sighed at the woman's stubbornness. He turned away from her and left the room. As he made his way down the stairs to grab a snack, he thought, she looks like she's going to collapse. Why have her sleeping patterns become so erratic?

Harry first noticed the sleeping issues the very first night that he and Tessa had come home with the baby. Tessa constantly checked on the child that night. In Harry's opinion, this was probably natural; after all, she _had_ been bound to the child for nine months…perhaps she was having some separation issues. However, when she discovered that the locks on the nursery windows were broken, Tessa was inconsolable for hours and cried copious tears, despite Harry's quick wand work and protestations that the locks were now fully functional. Harry did his best to comfort Tessa, but she wouldn't listen to him. As the nights passed, she eventually took to sitting by Abigail's cradle and watching the child while she slept instead of joining Harry in their four-poster bed. She'll be safer this way, Tessa explained to him. Safe from what? Harry pondered to himself. Nobody who could hurt us knows we're here.

Tessa was diligent to the point of obsession about making sure that the baby was well fed and comfortable. As a result, the woman rarely slept; when she did sleep, it was fitful and not very restful. The bags underneath her eyes were growing larger by the day and it truly worried Harry. Was she perhaps worried that she would lapse into another coma? Perhaps this was indeed the case, he surmised, as, when she did take some time to sleep, Tessa would set an alarm clock to wake herself up every half-hour. He attempted to encourage Tessa to take a Dreamless Sleeping draught so that she could have a peaceful slumber, but she merely told him that there was no scientific evidence that could prove that Dreamless Sleeping draughts would not transfer to Abigail through her milk and therefore staunchly refused them.

Something else bothered Harry as well. Nearly three weeks had passed since Tessa had awakened from her coma at St. Mary's, but she was not entirely well yet. She was weak and sore, which was to be expected, but she also seemed preoccupied with something, Harry thought…it could have been the baby, he guessed, but he had a nagging suspicion that it was something more. Was it the ring? She hadn't commented on the fact that it was back on her finger and Harry had been too nervous to bring it up. He wasn't sure he wanted to know the story behind it.

Tessa hadn't even mentioned Edward since she had asked about him at the hospital, which Harry thought odd. Surely she would have wanted a visit from the man who had saved her life? Tessa was jumpy too—she was startled at anything in the house that, to her, seemed out of place.

Tessa also cried a lot, now. Harry observed her crying when she thought he couldn't see; it was always over such silly things! She cried when Harry helped her over the threshold and into the house on her first day back; she cried the first time she stepped into the nursery and placed Abigail into her cradle for a nap; she cried when Harry had told her he needed to go to Hogwarts and finish his Potions final. This crying thing had annoyed Harry a little bit--surely she didn't expect him to miss his exams!

__

"Don't leave me alone, Harry!" Tessa pleaded. Her eyes were nearly wild with fright. "Please don't leave me alone." She clutched Abigail in her arms as she begged him to stay with her.

"Honey, what's the matter?" Harry asked. "You know I have to pass this exam before I'm allowed to complete my year. Dumbledore was good enough to get me an extension on my finals due to your condition and I need to finish now." He kissed her cheek and the top of Abigail's forehead. "I won't be gone long. Three or four hours, max!"

It had nearly killed him to listen to her desperate sobs as he left the house and prepared to Apparate to Hogwarts. He remembered that the doctors at St. Mary's had advised the couple that Tessa would be prone to tears for a while after the baby had been born. Was it normal for a woman to cry _this _much? Harry wondered. He began to seriously consider asking Sirius whether his mother had been the same way. He couldn't help but harbor the nagging suspicion that Tessa may be experiencing something beyond the normal "baby blues", but he also realized that Tessa would certainly never tell him if it were the case! Tessa was the type of woman who seemed to prefer to work out her own issues. More than once this foible had gotten her into trouble, however; Harry wished that she would open up to him, if for no other reason than to put her problems out into the open and not keep them bottled up inside. He had done everything he could think of to encourage her, but, as the saying went, you can lead a horse to water, but you can't make her drink it.

"Can I bring you up a snack?" Harry called up the stairs. "Perhaps a glass of milk?"

"I'm fine!" Tessa answered.

Tessa sighed heavily as she watched her husband leave the room; his facial features were puzzled and his brow wrinkled with concern for her. What Harry did not know was that she was both afraid and mortified. She didn't want to ever tell Harry about what had happened during her coma at St. Mary's. She was ashamed to tell him that she had Dreamfasted with Peter Pettigrew. It had been an accident, really. She wasn't even aware that she had the ability to Dreamfast until Wormtail had alerted her to the fact. Unfortunately for Tessa, he was a Dreamfaster as well and seemed very keen on using the ability to his advantage.

Tessa's mind flashed back to the dream...she saw Wormtail standing in the nude before her,proudly displaying The Full Monty, and shuddered. She had fought to avert her eyes, but the situation was like a bad car accident: she knew that she shouldn't look, but she just couldn't help it. Now the image was burned into her brain like a ghastly brand. What can I do to get that picture out of my head? She thought desperately. I can't _Obliviate _myself! She sighed as she tried unsuccessfully to forget about it.

Even scarier than the vision of Wormtail in the buff were the jarring words he had spoken to her during her coma:

__

"This is my dream, and I summoned you! You won't be able to leave until I say you may or either you or I awaken, therefore breaking the bond!"

As a result, Tessa was now petrified to go to sleep. She didn't want to risk the possibility of being summoned by Wormtail for another Dreamfasting session. He had displayed in the coma-induced vision that he had the power to coerce her into doing things that she would normally never do using merely his will. During her coma, he had somehow placed the idea into her brain that he was "all that" and devilishly alluring and that she _must _kiss him, so she had, despite the fact that she hated him with the intensity of a thousand suns.

As if that were not bad enough, much as she was loathed to admit it, she had rather enjoyed the kiss; she had honestly felt that the Earth moved beneath her in that moment and this concept shamed her more than anything else could. Before things had gotten way, way out of hand, Tessa had somehow managed to wake herself up. However, she didn't know if she would have the strength to get away from him again, ergo her reluctance to sleep. If she didn't sleep, she reasoned, she couldn't dream; if she couldn't dream, the rat couldn't get to her: she would be safe from possible attack.

Unfortunately, she felt that she couldn't tell Harry about the dream: he might not understand the circumstances. If Harry found out that she had kissed Peter, whether she was manipulated or not, Tessa was convinced that he would most probably leave her for good. She didn't want to anger him again, like she had last Valentine's Day; she had shared one other kiss with Peter, albeit while he was in handyman form and she didn't know who he really was. She hadn't asked for that particular kiss either, but Harry had become angrier with her than she ever thought a person could get and she didn't want a repeat performance.

As the newborn nursed contentedly, Tessa looked around the nursery, her exhausted blue eyes surveying every inch of the room. In another time, in another situation, it would have been a comforting place to be: the walls were painted a pale pink and a darling border of multicolored ducks graced the room. A white cradle stood in the corner, next to a beautiful dressing table stacked high with nappies and extra clothing for Abigail. It looked, for all intents and purposes, to be a sweet little nursery for a sweet little girl.

But Wormtail had decorated the room; Wormtail had selected the border; he had put the cradle together; he had painted the walls; he knew every inch of the house because he had been working there for months. He had come, unwanted, into Harry and Tessa's lives, and had the power to continue infiltration. Everywhere she looked in the house, she could see him--almost feel his presence, despite the fact that he had not entered the house in weeks…that she knew of. Oh my God! She thought. What if he's in rat form and scurrying around the house right now? Despite Harry's adamant statements in the hospital that he had "given Edward what he deserved", Tessa was fearful. It would have been completely out of character for Wormtail or Voldemort to give up on something they wanted so quickly…

Tessa stopped rocking in the chair. She disengaged herself from the tiny child and placed her in the cradle. Little Abigail, who was not finished eating, was, quite frankly, not amused. The newborn let out a shriek of protest and waved her arms as her mother stepped away from the cradle. Tessa's hand flew to her mouth and she stumbled out of the room and across the hallway. She reached the toilet and began to vomit violently. She did not stop until only dry heaves escaped her. Once finished, Tessa sat on the floor and rocked back and forth, the cries of her baby girl falling on deaf ears.

Harry heard the commotion and raced up the stairs as fast as he could. He burst through the lavatory door and saw Tessa on the floor. She was muttering to herself about locks and protective wards and other things that Harry could not discern. Nearly forty-eight hours of sleep deprivation was rapidly rendering Tessa irrational, Harry thought.

Tears coursed down Tessa's cheeks as she looked up at Harry. Harry crouched next to her and placed a hand on her shoulder. "Tessa, what's the matter? Are you ill? Do you need me to take you back to the hospital?" Tessa struggled to stand. Harry got back to his feet and held his hands out to her. She took them gratefully in her own and Harry pulled her up.

Once she was on her feet, she attempted a stab at lightness at the strange situation: "You must think I'm a sandwich short of a picnic… sitting here on the bathroom floor, babbling like a lunatic!" She flashed a quick smile.

Harry was not amused. "I'm taking you to bed now," he stated firmly. "You're scaring me."

"I don't want to go to sleep!" Tessa sobbed as she clutched Harry by the arms. Her wild eyes searched his for some semblance of understanding. Finding none, she buried her face in his chest. "Please, Harry, just leave me alone. I'll be all right…I promise you that I will be all right."

"You need to talk to someone, Tessa. Preferably me! I don't know how much longer I--"

She shook her head. "I'm fine, Harry! Just baby blues," she tried to speak convincingly. She met his eyes, afraid of what she might see. Does he see the guilt on my face? Do I wear my shame like a scarlet letter around my neck? Unconsciously, Tessa's hand reached up to her throat at the thought.

Harry's heart was heavy with concern for his wife. "I don't believe you," Harry said in a firm voice. "You're going to go to bed right now and, with God as my witness, you're going to sleep through the entire night. I'll get up with Abigail, but you need your rest!"

"No!" shouted Tessa. "I need to watch her!"

"You have tried my patience once too many times, Tessa!" Harry cried. "If you don't go to bed _RIGHT NOW_, I am going to stun you myself and force you to drink a sleeping draught!"

"You wouldn't!" hissed Tessa, her face mutinous.

"_Try me_!" Harry retorted as he reached into his robes and pulled out his wand. He trained it directly on his wife. His hand was steadier than Tessa had ever seen it. He means business, she grumbled to herself. If he only understood what potentially lies beyond my consciousness he'd try and force Pepper up potion into me, I would wager.

Tessa read Harry's resolute expression and sighed in defeat. "Fine, I will go to bed," she said in a sulky voice. "But you're to wake me up in half an hour," she warned. She brushed past Harry, her nose in the air and her steps a bit harder against the floor than was really necessary. A moment or two later the door to the master bedroom closed with a slam.

Harry had not moved from his spot in the bathroom. "Course I will," Harry said, crossing his fingers behind his back. Forgive me, hon, but you need the rest. I don't know why you don't trust me with the baby, but you're going to get some quality sleep!" He shook his head in aggravation and walked out of the bathroom.

He turned in the direction of the nursery and stepped to Abigail's cradle. The baby was still crying; her back was arched and her face was beetroot-red; her little were hands balled into tight fists. Harry bent over and carefully picked the little girl up, being careful to support her head. He placed the child over his shoulder and rubbed her little back. Presently, she stopped crying and snuggled against him.

"It's going to be just you and me tonight, Abbey Road," he whispered as he carried her out of the room and into the hallway. "How's about you and I go downstairs and see what we can conjure up for a snack? I think I saw a bottle of formula in the refrigerator with your name on it!"

Abbey sighed contentedly.

"Finally," Harry muttered, only half-joking, "a woman who isn't hard to please!"

Voldemort stepped away from his crystal Orb, which sat on top of an ornate, impressive looking container. The Orb glowed amber in the dimness of the room, the shifting smoke in its depths eerily beautiful and hypnotic in its movements. The time had arrived, he thought with a twisted grin, for some action. It was time for his second in command to return to his Master's service.

"Lucius!" he called out in a dreadful voice, "I require your assistance!"

Lucius Malfoy approached the altar. "What do you need from me, Master?" he asked as he genuflected before the Dark Lord.

"You are going to find our errant second in command and bring him back here. How _dare _he disobey me and then have the audacity to not return?" The Dark Lord's unusually high voice was nearly reedy with anger.

"Why would you even want him back, my Lord? He is incompetent…a waste of pure wizarding blood, if you ask me."

"Wormtail has a power that none of you other pathetic lackeys possess!" cried Voldemort, his eyes glittering with malice. "He is a Dreamfaster…and I shall make certain that he puts his one talent to good use!"

Lucius was impressed. Dreamfasting was indeed a rare gift. Such a shame, he thought, that the gift should reside in a man so utterly wretched as Peter Pettigrew. "Where would I go to find him, Master?"

As he pulled out his yew and phoenix feather wand, Voldemort gave the tall blond wizard a truncated grin and waved the magical item slowly over the Orb. "_Aparecium Wormtail_!" The Orb slowly spun on its invisible axis, its red center pulsating with a steady oscillation. The smoke cleared and slowly Wormtail came into view. He was lying in a very large bed, laughing; his eyes were screwed shut and his hands were clenching the bed sheets. A buxom brunette, whose hands were busy underneath the duvet, accompanied him. It did not take a rocket scientist to establish what was going on.

"Egad," Lucius said as a sickened expression crossed his handsome features. "I just ate, My Lord!" He averted his eyes from the scene.

The Dark Lord shot Malfoy a scathing look that would have rendered almost any wizard speechless. Lucius quickly composed himself and forced his eyes back to the Orb. The couple was now kissing, their hands all over each other. Lucius silently thanked the stars that, while the Orb would show things, it did not allow the watcher to hear things. Had it been different, Lucius probably would have become physically ill.

"I see that Wormtail is at the moment…_occupied_," Voldemort hissed, absolutely no humor in his voice. His eyes peered closely into the ball. "To the unpracticed eye, one merely sees the obvious, Lucius. I, thankfully, have the intelligence to look beyond the mundane: something you evidently do not possess. If you focus your attention on the bedside table, a matchbook with the name of the establishment is clearly in view: 'Wonderland Gentleman's Club'." He raised his head and met Lucius' cold gray eyes. The Dark Lord stepped away from the Orb and walked slowly around it, so that he stood directly in front of the Death Eater, his evil eyes never wandering from those of Lucius.

"Wormtail has disobeyed me and needs to be punished. Do you know where this club is located?"

"I do, sir," answered Lucius, reddening slightly at the admission. "It is an upscale Muggle establishment that caters to men of extravagant means. I believe it's located in the Diamond district of London, your Lordship."

"You will go there tonight and bring him back here. Take Crabbe and Goyle with you. They need to blow off a little steam. If Wormtail does not come along willingly, do whatever it takes to bring him back here alive. "

"And healthy, Your Lordship?"

"I said _alive_. Read into that whatever you like, my slippery friend."

Lucius smiled wickedly as he clasped his hands together and bowed low to his Master. "It shall be my utmost pleasure to serve you, My Lord."

As Lucius bowed and exited the room, Voldemort's eyes focused back on the crystal ball. He muttered an incantation and the smoke shifted. When the smoke cleared, a two-story house could be seen. In one upstairs window, The Dark Lord could make out a shape of a tired young man carrying a tiny baby.

"Enjoy the child while you can, Harry. She will not be yours for long…."

__

Thanks for reading chapter one of "The Devil's Dilemma." I am going to try and post regularly…every two weeks. Could be more time, could be less…I have a very busy schedule. If you have not read "The Devil's Deal" I would recommend it because it is the prequel to this story and also explains in a little more depth why every character is acting as they are. -webba


	2. I've Got You Under my Skin

**__**

"The Devil's Dilemma"

Chapter Two

"I've Got You Under My Skin"

__

I'd sacrifice anything, come what might,

For the sake of having you near!

In spite of the warning voice the comes in the night,

And whispers and whispers in my ear:

"Don't you know, little fool, you never can win**!**

__

Use your mentality, wake up to reality!"

But each time I do…just the thought of you,

Makes me 'stop' before I begin

'Cause I've got you . . . Hmm I got you,

I got you . . . under my skin!

Words and Music by Cole Porter; this version sung by the "Chairman" himself, Frank Sinatra

Tessa stood in the middle of her rose garden with one hand on one hip and the back of her hand against her sweaty forehead; dirt was caked underneath her fingertips and the smell of newly turned earth was prevalent in her nostrils. She tended to blooms that were absolutely stunning in their beauty--deep reds, brilliant whites and tender pinks. Truth be told, she was a bit surprised at her success with the flowers; it was no secret that her horticultural skills were sorely lacking. Perhaps it was the new fertilizer, she mused to herself with a smile.

She looked over at her daughter who was lying nearby, sleeping soundly in her baby seat. Abigail was certainly a good sleeper and (most of the time, anyway) an easy baby! She was, Tessa supposed, with the kind of pride that only a mother possesses, the kind of baby that all mothers must wish for. Tessa laughed heartily as she pruned one of the bushes.

Suddenly, the world around her shifted violently and she was no longer tending her garden in Staplehurst. She stood instead in the middle of a cavernous, chilly gray room with a cathedral ceiling. Panic settled in her stomach as she tried to ascertain exactly where she was. The room was not familiar to her. She looked about, straining to see despite the dimness. The only light in the room came from the moonlight that streamed through one small, narrow window and several sets of white tapered candles sitting in candelabra set strategically in the room. A tiny wooden writing desk stood in one corner, piled high with parchments, several quills, and bottles of ink in various colors and several very thick books. In one other corner stood an ordinary looking cot with a thin blue blanket on it. A long, winding stone staircase led up to an oaken door with a ringed handle. That must be the way out, Tessa thought to herself.

At this point Tessa discovered that she was completely alone. She looked about, frantically trying to find Abigail, who was nowhere to be seen. Completely beside herself with worry and fear, she looked down at herself and realized that she no longer wore her patched, old work robes; instead, she now wore nothing but a white silk nightdress and a thin robe. Her feet were bare. She shivered from the cold and blew on her hands to try and warm them as she stepped to the nearby grate and attempted to get a fire going.

As she concentrated on stirring the glowing red coals with a poker, she did not hear the door to the chambers open behind her and a man's footsteps against the uneven stones.

The man ambled down the stairs in a lazy fashion as if he had all the time in the world to spare. Once down the stairs he walked across the room on small, silent feet. Approximately ten feet from the object of his desire, the man stopped where he was. So busy was Tessa with the fire that she was oblivious to the threat of danger behind her.

"Hello, Tessa," Peter said pleasantly. Tessa gave a yelp of surprise as she whirled around, swinging the poker before her in an attempt at self-defense. When she saw that the intruder was Wormtail, she clutched the poker tightly to her chest. She looked around the room one more time, her eyes searching for an alternate escape route. Finding none, she turned her gaze once more to the short man in front of her.

"Why are you here?" she demanded. "I'm awake!"

"I think not, my dear," Wormtail said amicably as he waved his wand and summoned a vision. A rainbow of colors issued from his wand and hung suspended for a moment in the air before they melded and twisted together, forming the shapes of people and furniture. A doppleganger Tessa lay upon a four-poster bed with a sleeping Harry's arms around her. The vision was blurred around the edge and unfocused. Tessa clapped one hand to her mouth, her eyes wide with shock as comprehension dawned that indeed she was asleep.

"You've been asleep for over three hours," the little man said with glee. He made a wide sweeping gesture with both of his hands. "Welcome to my chambers!" Wormtail snapped his metallic fingers and Tessa's sleeping image evaporated into a mist. "Admittedly not much to look at, but I call it home." He looked her up and down and nodded appreciatively. He rubbed his hands together in a manner that Tessa found rather disturbing as he continued to eye her up. She pulled her robe tighter around her. "What a delightful treat…at least, for me anyway! You c--certainly go a long way to im--improving my décor!"

I've been asleep for three hours? _Tessa thought. Why didn't Harry awaken me? "I have to wake up!" Tessa cried in a pleading voice. "Abigail needs me!"_

"Don't w--worry about the child. She is sleeping in her room. I have just ch--checked up on her," Peter said in a placating manner, as if he had done Tessa a huge favor.

"Don't you ever go near my child!" Tessa snarled, her grasp on the poker suddenly stronger. She shivered not only with cold, but also with fright.

Wormtail shook his head as he clucked his tongue. "My d--dear Tessa! There's no n—need to become angry with me! I did not h—harm a hair on her head!" He stepped closer to her and reached for the poker. "Give me the p--poker and let us chat for a while!"

"Don't come any closer, Wormtail. I'll use this on you…I mean it!" She raised the poker a bit as she spoke and stepped backwards. In doing so, she made contact with the rough stone wall. The poker struck the rocks and the clash of metal against stone rang throughout the room.

Wormtail sauntered closer to Tessa, then suddenly placed the index finger of his metallic hand to his lips and bowed his head ever so slightly, as if pondering something. Tessa mistook his body language as a signal of weakness and lowered the poker slightly. This proved to be a huge mistake, as Wormtail suddenly grabbed the poker in a swift motion, wrenching it from the woman's grasp. He threw it across the room and it landed with a clang in the far corner. He advanced on her like a lion to its prey. Tessa raised her hands in an attempt to push Wormtail away from her, but he grabbed her hands before she could get a decent grasp on his face. As soon as their fingers made contact, a sensation like an electric current passed between them and a flash of blue light seemed to radiate from both of them. Does this always happen when people Dreamfast? Tessa wondered as briefly both she and her aggressor stared at the reaction.

The moment was short-lived. Wormtail forced her hands against the wall, pinning them there. She fought valiantly against him but, because she was still weak from childbirth, she was not much of a hindrance to him. She stopped struggling and became still. He was so near to her that she could feel his chest against hers through the thin material of the dressing gown. She turned her head away from him and squeezed her eyes closed. Wormtail smelled of cigarettes, cheap beer and also of…honeysuckle? That was unexpected…what in the world? She thought.

"What do you want?" she said in a frightened voice, afraid of the answer she was going to receive.

Wormtail snorted with laughter. He looked up into her eyes. "What do I want? You know, I—I don't think anyone's asked me that in a v—very long time, my dear," Wormtail intoned as he smiled wickedly at her. He forced her to meet his gaze. "I want a nice peanut b--butter and jam sandwich, actually. On white bread. Oh yeah, and perhaps a nice b--bottle of b--butterbeer and some of those delightful chocolate chip b--biscuits you make. They're delicious!"

Tessa tried in vain to yank her hands away from Peter's. The stones in the wall were beginning to dig into her skin and it hurt. "I think that perhaps you're being facetious, Wormtail. Somehow, I'm surprised that you actually have the skill to pull that off!" she said rather stupidly.

"You've still not learned to keep your m--mouth shut, I see. That's r--really going to get you into a world of hurt one of these days," he pointed out harshly. "What do you think _I want?" he asked, his tone gentler now. He stood on his tiptoes and kissed her softly on the mouth. Tears trickled down Tessa's cheeks as she closed her eyes. She stood very still and did not respond to his kiss at all. After five or six seconds of this, Peter broke the pseudo-kiss and pulled away from her so that his face was mere inches from hers. He still had her hands pinned to the wall._

Tessa's eyes opened slowly. "If there is any honor left within you, Peter, you will not do that again," she whispered.

Honor. That word inserted into a sentence with his name in it was so foreign that it was almost ironic. The priest in the cathedral had spoken of honor. As much as he didn't want to, Peter reluctantly let go of Tessa and stepped back.

Tessa grabbed her left wrist in her right hand and rubbed it. She gave Peter a questioning look.

"I promise that I will not kiss you again until you ask me to," Peter said in a solemn voice. His blue-gray eyes were completely sober as he said this.

How dare he even assume, thought Tessa, that I would ever entertain the notion? She scowled at Wormtail as her sarcasm returned. "You're awfully confident Wormtail, now aren't you?" she said in a condescending tone. "I will never kiss you. Find someone else to stalk, will you? I've had enough of it!"

"I guarantee you that b--before your baby utters her first word, you will_ ask me to kiss you," Wormtail said in a superior voice. "You e--enjoyed our last kiss together, when we first Dreamfasted together! Don't stand before me and try to deny it! I can read y--your thoughts." He took another step backward. "You w--wonder if you could control y--yourself with me if I kissed you again. You want to feel the earth move a--again!"_

Ratty bastard! Tessa thought. "The kiss was probably only enjoyable because it was your fantasy, you sick, twisted thing. You can be any kind of kisser you want to be in your dreams…you could be bloody Mel Gibson if you set your mind to it!"

For a moment the little man looked confused. Who is Mel Gibson? He thought. "If that's the case, then why do you feel so guilty?" Wormtail asked aloud in a singsong voice. "Is it perhaps b--because Harry's kisses fall m--miserably short of m--mine?"

Argh!

Peter grinned sadistically. "Check and mate, madam!" he said, giving Tessa a sweeping bow.

Tessa was beside herself with fury. "How dare _you say such things to me? Harry's ten times the kisser you are, even in your dreams!"_

"K--Keep repeating that over and over, my darling; because if you do it might make the statement t--true!" Wormtail giggled eerily. "I--I'm not gong to k--kiss you until you ask me to, although you need it. You need kissing and often and b--by someone who knows _how!"_

Tessa's eyes narrowed at the podgy wizard who stood before her. "You're a shifty little shit, you know that?" she asked hysterically.

Wormtail's voice was the epitome of calm. "I'm disappointed, Tessa my s—sweet. The last time you swore at me the l—language was almost p--poetic in its fluidity and iambic pentameter."

__

Iambic pentameter? _Tessa thought. How in the world would you even know what that meant, much less use the phrase correctly, you insipid little troll?_

"I read a lot of Shakespeare as a ch--child," Peter responded aloud. "The Bard was renowned for his use of the l--literary device." His face showed no emotion, but his body language suggested that he was somewhat uncomfortable with the admission. Tessa, sharp as a tack, picked up on it, but said nothing. "I wasn't very popular when I was young. I was short, I was fat and…"

Was? _Thought Tessa, with a snort of mental laughter_. _"As opposed to now, where you're svelte and oh so debonair? Not to mention a hit with the ladies," she commented derisively._

"Why do I even b--bother telling you this if all you're going to do is insult me?"

Tessa shook her head in disbelief. "I don't care what _you tell me! I don't care about you! If you died right now before me I would laugh! If you were lying by the side of the road, dying of thirst, I wouldn't offer you a drink of water! You make me want to retch! Couldn't you have been caught in a rat trap at some point during your many years as Scabbers and made the world that much more peaceful?"_

"Tell me how you r--really feel, my little Scrabble queen_!"_

Wormtail smiled merrily as he turned around and walked to the doorway of the chamber. At that moment, Tessa noticed a faint pink lipstick stain on the collar of Wormtail's shirt. A name flashed unbidden across her brain… Melissa?

"Who is Melissa?"

Wormtail stopped dead in his tracks and pulled at his shirt collar as if it was a tad snug. For a beginner, Tessa's Dreamfasting abilities were quite sharp he thought…perhaps just a smidgen too sharp. "She's a…friend,_" Wormtail said with a blush. "She is of n--no consequence to you!" He took a moment to compose himself. Tessa could not know about his dealings with the prostitute and the black negligee he had stolen and forced the girl to wear, he thought fervently. Think about something else…you must throw Tessa off the track. He tried to concentrate on something else, but it was like being told not to think about a pink elephant: once the suggestion presents itself, despite one's best intentions to the contrary, one thinks of pink elephants. Try as he might, Wormtail could not stop thinking about it. He was a doomed man and he knew it, or so he thought. He gave Tessa a sheepish look._

Tessa's brow furrowed in confusion. She could feel guilt and humiliation radiating off of the wizard like a stench, but could not establish why. All she knew was that the topic of this "Melissa" woman was off-limits. He wasn't going to discuss her no matter how hard she prodded.

Not that she cared.

She looked down at Wormtail who was doing his best to keep his face expressionless and uncaring but was not succeeding. Wait a minute, she thought as a slow smile spread across her face. I think I know why he's not too keen to discuss the mystery woman. I don't need to be able to read his thoughts for this, she thought smugly. "Melissa's a prostitute, isn't she?" Tessa asked as she crossed her arms over her chest.

"That, Tessa, is none of your business," Wormtail answered shortly. His face turned an unbecoming shade of magenta.

Tessa began to laugh cruelly. "Melissa is a prostitute. That's bloody funny, Wormtail! I'll bet you had to pay her double the going rate just so that she'd lower herself to your level!" Tessa stepped very close to Peter and bent over slightly so she could look him squarely in the eye. She wore a nasty smirk. "Even a whore who has gone to the bad won't be had by a rat!"

Wormtail instinctively raised his fists and made to swing at Tessa. She panicked and threw her arms over her face. At the very last minute, he dropped his hands to his sides. "It's a good thing I c--care about you or I would forget you w--were a woman for about twenty seconds," Wormtail muttered.

"I want out of this nightmare!" Tessa cried, lowering her arms.

"Oh, but you'll never be out of the n--nightmare," Wormtail said as he turned away from her. He strode purposefully up the narrow gray staircase that would lead him to a heavy oaken door with an iron ring handle. Placing one hand on the ring, he turned to her once more.

"When you f--failed to comply with the conditions of m--my Master's plan you created a nightmare that will not end until the D--Dark Lord executes revenge. I fail to understand why a woman as clever as you are hasn't h--heeded my warning yet. Every day that you fail to so brings your family one st--step closer to Hell." He opened the door.

Tessa watched him as he stepped away from her. His face belies his true feelings, she thought. I don't know exactly what he's thinking in terms of words, but I can see that something torments him. Probably the fact that he knows he's a pig-headed, obnoxious, fool she thought.

Finally, Wormtail's outer expression of complacency fell apart, revealing a face twisted with anger. Now standing in the doorway, the man spun around, his eyes flashing dangerously. "Mark my w—words, Tessa Pettigrew, you haven't seen the last of me," he said in a nasty voice. "The next time we meet in the flesh, I won't be so p—pleasant.

"Quit calling me Tessa Pettigrew! That's not my name!" Tessa screamed shrilly.

"Fear me…fear the wrath of the Dark Lord. Your whole family is in danger." With that, Peter exited the room, his robes swishing impressively around his chubby figure and Tessa found herself falling…falling…falling into darkness.

__

Harry awoke to the sound of talking. "We're not safe…the Dark Lord is coming…"

Harry sleepily struggled into a sitting position and placed his arms around his wife. "Shhh, honey," he whispered as he held her, "you're going to wake Abigail!"

Tessa's eyes were wide and fixed as if staring at something or someone only she could see. She appeared to be carrying on a conversation with herself; sometimes her voice sounded like hers always did and sometimes the voice was lower and desperate-sounding. The effect was creepy.

"He's coming…we're safe here…n--no, you're not, you're all in danger…" Tessa babbled.

"Who's coming?" Harry asked. He pulled her close as she continued babbling about Abigail and hiding somewhere safe. "Nobody is coming, Tessa! Like I've been telling you for days and days, we are perfectly safe here!"

"You n--need to get out…Harry says that…Harry's f--full of grade-A…don't talk that way about--" Tessa snapped out of her trance with a start. She looked about the bedroom as if unsure as to how she had managed to get there. She looked at Harry, who wore an expression of complete bewilderment. "I was talking in my sleep, wasn't I?" she asked in an embarrassed tone of voice.

"Yes, you were. You were rambling on about how we're not safe. You said my name quite a few times too," Harry answered. He frowned at Tessa. "I don't suppose you're going to tell me what this dream entailed."

She shook her head negatively as she leaned against Harry's chest and kissed his fingers. "I just had a silly dream. I know we're safe, Harry…I am just…I don't know what I am anymore! I think I'm going to get up and tend to Abigail. I'm not tired anymore." She placed one final kiss on Harry's fingers. "I will be just fine, honey."

"I want to believe you, I really do, but these dreams and your refusal to sleep has gone on for far too long." Harry stroked her hair with one hand. "Why don't you want to sleep? You're a zombie! Your eyes are all bloodshot, you're pale as a ghost and you've been tiptoeing around the house looking over your shoulder every chance you get! It's like you're afraid that someone's going to attack you! What is the matter?" Harry pleaded. "Tell me!"

Tessa swung her feet over the side of the bed and pushed herself off. She picked up her robe from her chair and pulled it over her shoulders. "I want to tell you, Harry, I want to tell you so badly but if I do, you're going to leave me; and I love you and don't want to live without you," Tessa stated aloud.

This was new, Harry thought. I thought I was prepared for anything she could say. How wrong I was. "I'm going to _leave _you?" Harry asked incredulously. He picked up his glasses from the bedside table and put them on. "What makes you think that I'm going to leave you over some silly dream? Tessa, come back to bed right now!" He checked his watch. "It is 2:45 AM!" He beckoned to his wife with one hand but Tessa ignored him.

"I'm going to check on Abigail," Tessa said as she walked to the bedroom door.

"No you're not!" Harry stated. "I will check on Abigail. You're coming back to bed and getting some sleep. You've not slept well for three weeks and it's high time you got some rest. Come back here!" he cried.

From the nursery, a thin wail could be heard. Abigail had heard the commotion and awakened.

Tessa's voice was cold. "See what you've done? Now she's awake!" Tessa pulled the door open and headed into the hall.

Harry rolled his eyes. It's come to _this, _has it? He thought_._ Sliding out of bed, he followed his wife into the nursery, his wand in his hand. He peeked into the nursery and watched as Tessa sleepily picked up the child and fumbled with the clasp on her nightdress. She sat down in the rocking chair and began to make herself comfortable. Not tonight, Tessa, Harry thought. You've worked too hard. You need a break and you're too stubborn to take one. He pointed his wand in her direction.

"Placidus somnus!"

Immediately, Tessa fell into a deep sleep. Harry quickly rushed to her side and took the child from her limp arms. He placed Abigail into her cradle and scooped Tessa into his arms. Harry lovingly carried her back to her bed and placed the duvet over her. As he walked downstairs and mixed up a bottle of formula for his crying daughter, he couldn't help but wonder if things would ever be normal again for himself and his little family.

**__**

Peter wouldn't have awakened when he did, given the option. The large bed he currently shared with the lovely Melissa was warm, soft and comfortable; it was quite a change from the cast iron cot with the lumpy mattress he was used to. Imbibing six beers over the course of an hour had finally caught up with him however and the dull ache in his bladder had become incredibly uncomfortable. He tried to quell the urge as he turned over sluggishly, pulled the duvet up to his chin and glanced at the woman who was still sleeping next to him.

Melissa was snoring softly, her long chestnut brown hair spread across her pillow in a becoming fan. Still wearing the sheer black negligee that belonged to Tessa, she unknowingly elicited a definite physical response from the man who was staring at her. Peter smirked as he felt a familiar stirring in his loins. He glanced up at the large clock on the wall of the tastefully decorated room and saw that it was 2:45 AM. Melissa belonged to him for another four hours. Perhaps he'd have one more romp with her before he left the establishment.

Unable to ignore the call of nature any longer, Peter reluctantly slid out of the bed and padded slowly to the nearby toilet, not bothering to dress. As he relived himself, he couldn't help but smile as the remembrance of his most recent dream popped into his head. He had managed to fluster Tessa quite completely with reference to the kiss that they had shared weeks earlier. He remembered her stammered response and the pink flush that had crept into her cheeks as she hopelessly tried to defend her husband. She may hate Wormtail the man, but she loves Wormtail the kisser, he thought with a chuckle, and it bothers the hell out of her!

It isn't right, though, a nagging voice in the recesses of his brain admonished him, to put the woman through such misery if you really and truly love her. She made her decision regarding whom she loves and it's not you. Can you blame her? You _did _kill her parents. That's bound to put a damper on any relationship!

"Stupid bloody conscience!" Peter grumbled. He sighed as he flushed. It had been this way with him for three weeks. He really _had_ tried several techniques to push Tessa from his mind for good once he knew that she was going to survive the coma, but it was difficult. He had tried alcohol. He had tried various women in several establishments (but none as deliciously entertaining as the naughty Melissa, who, through her inspired performance the previous evening had earned her the dubious distinction of becoming Peter's "All Time Favorite Shag"). He had even taken pills he bought from a surly teenager that he had encountered in his travels (which, after ingesting, only caused him to be convinced for a short time that he was a hummingbird of some sort).

None of his quick fixes helped for long: his relationship with Tessa was unlike any schoolboy crush he had ever had; any girl he had pined for during his time at Hogwarts had usually ignored him or laughed at him. Not that this was particularly amusing in any way whatsoever; it wasn't. His current feelings for Tessa were sweet and terrible and angst-filled all at once because his affections had been rewarded, at least on a small level. And that, he thought, was much worse than simply being ignored.

Well, he wasn't about to be ignored any longer! There was a damned sexy woman just behind the lavatory door who would be willing to do anything for him, at least for the next little while. Peter washed and dried his hands and pulled on the door handle that would open and lead him back to the bed and to Melissa. He suddenly felt the need to be punished in a major way. Perhaps she was up for a little role-playing. One way to find out, he surmised.

He stepped into the main room and lifted his eyes to the bed. Suddenly, his blood seemed to freeze as he stopped mid-step and gaped in astonishment.

Melissa sat bolt upright in the bed, her eyes wide and scared. Tears streamed silently down her cheeks and she looked to Wormtail with an expression of pure unadulterated fright. Vincent Crabbe Senior held a long knife to her throat with one beefy arm; his other arm held Melissa close to him, pinning her arms so that she couldn't make any sudden movements.

Roger Goyle had his wand trained directly on the nearly nude form of Wormtail, his face alive with demented jollity. Lucius Malfoy stood close to the window, his eyes darting from Melissa to Roger to Wormtail and finally to the nearly empty streets below. He caught Wormtail's eye and gave a cruel sneer, as he looked the small, fat man up and down. So surprised was Wormtail at the intrusion that he merely stood where he was and made no attempt to cover himself. "'W--What are you doing here? H--how did you find me?" he squeaked.

"You have to be, without a doubt, the most pathetic looking excuse for a man I have ever seen," Lucius said in a soft voice, laced with distaste. "For the love of God, man, put on some _trousers_!" He threw Wormtail's trousers in the man's general direction. The wizard caught them deftly with one hand.

"And with as m--many naked men as you've seen in your d—day, that _would _be saying something now, wouldn't it?" Peter quipped. "Really n--now, Lucius, what _would_ Narcissa say?" He stepped into his trousers and zipped up his fly. "Don't worry yourself Malfoy…your little s--secret is safe with me!"

Lucius blanched for a moment then smoothed his features back into an expression of intense hatred. "Forgive me if I scoff at your foolish offer. Secrets have never been your strong suit, Wormtail." The other Death Eaters laughed.

"To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit, Malfoy?" asked Peter in an even tone of voice.

"Our Master requires the pleasure of your company you fool. Get dressed and come with us."

Peter cringed inwardly at the mention of his Master. I knew the time would come eventually, when Voldemort would choose to search me down and punish me for my actions, he thought. Why did I ever think I could run from the most powerful being of the age? Peter's next words were spoken aloud as he tried to mask his feelings of fear with words of bravado.

"I wasn't exactly e--expecting company, Lucius," snapped Peter angrily. He gestured to the large bed where Melissa sniffled and stared at him with a desperate countenance. Crabbe was pinning her arms so tightly bruises had already begun to develop on her arms. "As you can plainly see I h--have been otherwise occupied for the night. I own her for the next four hours. I intend on getting my m--money's worth!"

"The Master requires that we bring you back to his service," Lucius said, "and I intend to do my Master's bidding. Unlike you, I am not a sniveling coward who's afraid of his own shadow. I follow my Master's instructions. You're to accompany us back to his lair."

"And if I d--don't?" Wormtail asked defiantly.

Lucius turned to Crabbe and nodded curtly. Crabbe grabbed Melissa's chin and pulled upward, thus causing the skin on her throat to go taut. Turning the blunt end of the knife in her direction, Crabbe pulled back his arm with all his strength.

The pressure of the knife on her throat crushed her Adam's Apple completely and she began to slowly asphyxiate. Her eyes bulged helplessly as she desperately tried to take in precious oxygen. The air she _was _able to draw wasn't nearly enough and she began to claw at her throat as her face went from pink to red and then to white. She writhed and twisted on the bed like a fish out of water.

"S--stop!" Wormtail cried, aghast at the spectacle before his eyes. Lucius and the other men laughed. "I mean it…end this t--torture now! There's no p--point in making her s--suffer! She's innocent!" he said in a squeaky voice. He made a movement toward his jacket, where he had secured his wand in a hidden holster, but stopped in his tracks when Malfoy and Goyle turned their wands in his direction.

"No point?" Lucius voiced lazily. "Ah, my ignorant compatriot, but there is. You see, we could have simply performed the Killing Curse on the Muggle: no muss, no fuss. However, given that the situation involves _you, _we felt it fitting to show you what shall befall you should you not obey our Master," he finished with an aristocratic sneer.

Vincent looked to Lucius, whose steely gray eyes showed no trace of normal human emotion. "What should I do with her?" he asked.

"Finish her," Lucius said with a dismissive wave of his hand. He did not bother to look in the woman's direction.

In one final quick flick of the wrist Crabbe pulled the knife across the prostitute's throat, which left a long bloody gash directly underneath the Adam's apple. He released her arms and allowed her to fall forward onto the bed. Melissa drew gurgled breaths for a moment or two as she attempted to slide off the bed, but it wasn't long before she became silent as her life escaped her. Her eyes remained glassy and wide open as she expired unceremoniously on the bed of a gentleman's club; the unfortunate victim of circumstances she could not possibly have understood.

Wormtail's heart skipped a beat as he watched Melissa die before his eyes. She was bleeding all over the place and staining Wormtail's only physical connection to Tessa with her blood. He rushed over to the dead woman and fumbled with the fastenings on the material. Maybe he could still salvage the garment. "Y--you make your p--point very vividly, M--Malfoy," he stated through gritted teeth as he pulled at the material.

"Our Master is very upset with you, Pettigrew! He says that you're not worth the effort of waving his wand. I promise you that the punishment he gives you will not be swift and painless. He'll see to it that you're whipped back into shape." Malfoy's smile widened. "My only hope is that I will play some small part in watching you plead for your life!"

"Fuck you, Malfoy. I'm not going anywhere with y--you," Wormtail said as he successfully pulled the lingerie completely off of Melissa's body. Stuffing the soiled material into the pocket of his trousers, he suddenly transformed himself into a rat and scurried toward the door.

"I don't think so," Lucius intoned in a soft, nasty voice. He raised his wand and pointed it directly at the rat. "_Impedimenta!"_

Immediately Wormtail's movements slowed considerably, allowing Lucius ample time to saunter across the room and pick him up by his tail. He held the twitching ratat eye level and shook his head. Crabbe and Goyle laughed dully as they watched Peter frantically try to escape Lucius' grasp.

"You're a good-for-nothing piece of filth, Pettigrew, and an insult to the name of a Death Eater," Lucius said in a soft, hypnotic voice. "If it were up to me, I'd place your head underneath my foot and crush your skull with the heel of my boot." Wormtail writhed, twisted and squeaked as he desperately tried to free himself.

"Unfortunately for me, I don't get that option," Lucius continued. "That distinction belongs to Voldemort. We were asked to bring you back alive." As Lucius uttered this statement, Wormtail's movements ceased. He merely dangled by his tail from Lucius' hand. "Now, I wonder," intoned Lucius with an air of maddening superiority, "should we allow you to transform back into a _man_ or should we just throw you into a cage?"

Wormtail squeaked shrilly in response.

Lucius placed one hand to his ear theatrically. "Crabbe? Goyle? Did you two hear anything?"

"I heard Pettigrew--" began Crabbe stupidly.

"Duh, I think he was being sarcastic, Vincent," Goyle said to his colleague, demonstrating a rudimentary measure of intellect.

"Sack, Goyle," Malfoy commanded as he held out his hand. The man tossed Lucius a smelly brown burlap bag.

"I foresaw the idea that you might be cowardly enough to transform so I took precautions. Don't even think of trying to gnaw your way out of this bag, Wormtail. It's been enchanted so that, if you even try to bite through the material, it will stop allowing air to flow through and you will suffocate just like your hooker friend." Lucius gave Wormtail one more look of disgust, then threw the doomed Animagus into the bag and tied the top closed with a length of string.

With that, the group exited the room, locked the door behind them and left Wonderland by the back stairway.

Hours later, Harry opened the door to the master bedroom and stepped inside, being careful to make no sound as he tiptoed to the four-poster bed where Tessa still lay sleeping. She had been out for nearly twelve straight hours and had not moved from the position in which he had placed her much earlier that day. Her facial expression was one of a woman completely at ease and carefree. Harry wondered if he would ever see that expression on his wife's face again, truth be told. If he had harbored any guilt about placing a sleeping charm on her earlier, he banished the thoughts from his head as he looked upon her; she had needed the rest.

Harry sighed sadly as he took out his wand and pointed it at Tessa. He didn't really want to wake her, but Abigail was going to be hungry again fairly soon and they had run out of powdered formula. "_Ennervate!" _Harry said in a soft voice.

Tessa stirred. She stretched slowly, like a lazy cat. She yawned as she rubbed the sleep from her eyes with her fists. She opened her eyes and regarded Harry with a tired smile.

"Good morning, handsome," she said.

"Good morning to you," Harry said, sitting on the bed next to her and brushing his lips against hers. "Although it's not morning anymore: it's well past two o'clock in the afternoon! You've been sleeping for twelve hours!"

__

"Twelve hours?" Tessa cried. "Oh no! I have to get up…where's the baby?"

"Calm down, Tessa. Everything's fine. The baby is asleep in her cradle. I've taken good care of her today, but she needs you for a feeding," Harry said in a placating voice.

As Tessa turned over in the four-poster bed, she became keenly aware of the ache in her breasts. It had been a _long_ time since she had fed Abigail last. She sat up next to Harry, who passed Tessa her white robe. "Thank you, Harry," Tessa said, patting him on the hand. "You don't know how much I needed this," she added.

"Your robe? No problem, sweetheart," Harry said lamely.

"No, silly, I meant the charm," Tessa said, putting her arms around Harry and embracing him. "It was just what I needed and I was too tired and stubborn to see it," she added.

"No bad dreams this time?" Harry asked.

"None at all," Tessa assured him. "My sleep was dream-free and completely restful and I have you to thank for it. You're too good to me sometimes." She looked into Harry's eyes. "Kiss me," she said, pulling him very close so that their lips were very nearly touching.

Oh yes, Harry thought. I've waited for you to ask me to do that for weeks but you've been so preoccupied with the baby. "It would be my pleasure, Mrs. Potter," he said before pushing his lips into contact with hers. The kiss was sweet and hesitant at first, softness against softness, familiar and true. Gently, Harry parted Tessa's lips with his tongue and found hers. It was like coming home and he clutched her tighter as the kiss deepened.

If you were to ask him later exactly when the mood of the kiss changed, Harry would not have been able to tell you for certain; it was very a subtle shift, to be sure. He remembered Tessa's soft hands cupping his face and her small growl of pleasure from deep in her throat as her tongue flirted with his. He remembered her fingers gripping the small of his back, her nails digging almost painfully into his flesh as she whispered words of love to him between kisses.

It seemed to Harry that Tessa was kissing him as if she had something to prove: she became the aggressor, kissing him fiercely and passionately. He wasn't about to complain; a snog is a snog is a snog, he thought, and he wasn't about to bring up the issue that she was cutting off his air supply or that he would have swollen lips. In his opinion, the comments would not have been fitting, given the situation. She kissed him as if she had never kissed him before and may never get the chance again.

There was a certain desperateness to the kisses that Harry had never felt from her before. Perhaps it was due to the hormones that the doctors had told him about at the hospital. They were going to be somewhat out of whack for a while. Bottom line was that his mind was being, quite astoundingly, blown by her sweet lips against his and he was extremely excited about it. It looked like Tessa Potter was coming around to herself.

Tessa threw herself into Harry's arms, deepening the kiss as she bowled him over onto the bed. She ran a hand provocatively down the plane of his chest and allowed her fingers to rest on the top of his trousers. She could feel him hard against her. "You have to be the sexiest man alive," she whispered.

"Where'd this come from?" he squeaked in surprise. "Not that I am complaining, mind you!" he added with a smile as he placed his arms around her waist. "But uh…didn't the doctor say to wait six weeks before we uh…rouse the beast as it were?"

Tessa laughed. "I know, I know! I just wanted to show you how much I love you," Tessa answered. She embraced her husband tenderly. "You are my whole world, you and Abigail. Forever." She stood up and placed a hand on Harry's leg. "I will always love you, Harry. Don't ever forget that," she said. "No matter what happens you will always have my love."

"I know that, Tessa," Harry said, somewhat confused by her cryptic comment. "I will always love you too." The conversation was a bit more intense than Harry would have liked on only four hours of sleep, so he quipped, "Unless, of course, you're planning on having some sort of torrid affair with a mysterious man, that is!" He laughed aloud at his witty remark. He failed to notice that Tessa had suddenly gone silent and pale.

Tessa stared openmouthed at Harry for a moment, her blue eyes filling with tears, then turned on one heel and left the room on silent feet. A moment later, he heard the door to the nursery open and the sound of Tessa's voice as she awakened Abigail with a song.

Harry sat on the bed for a long time. What did I do? One minute she's great and the next minute she's miserable, he thought. She has been a prisoner of this house for nearly seven months. I wish there were a way I could get her out of here, at least for a few minutes. She needs to see something besides these walls and the baby. How could I accomplish the impossible and treat her to a night out?

Harry thought for a minute and an idea suddenly popped into his head. He raced downstairs to the family room and quickly grabbed a piece of parchment and a quill. He scrawled a quick message, then rolled up the parchment, placed a seal around it and whistled to Hedwig. He tied the note to her leg and opened the window so that she could fly away.

"Get this message to Sirius as quickly as you can!"

Cornelius Fudge was a man who liked coffee — and I mean _really _liked it. He enjoyed his coffee bitter and black-- none of that "multi-flavored, artsy-fartsy, new-agey, coffee wanna-be crap laced with milk and sugar" (his words, mind you). Fudge liked his Aurors strong and his coffee even stronger; those who worked under his supervision were only half-joking when they commented that, if the caffeinated beverage could ever be infused into his body intravenously, Fudge would be the first wizard to try it. The man could not complete a coherent thought before imbibing at least three cups of the brew. Because of this, a pot of the pungent concoction always awaited him in the morning so that, when he arrived at work, he could immediately head up to his office and get his daily fix before tackling the important business of the Ministry of Magic. It was an unwritten rule amongst the Ministry staff that Fudge was not to be disturbed during this time; that is, if you wanted to keep your job.

Apparently, nobody thought to tell Percy Weasley this (or perhaps they _did _think to tell him and just didn't bother; after all, he _did _come across as an insufferable know-it-all, and wasn't generally liked by the staff). Percy was actually known to point at his watch and shake his head when those he worked with arrived late to work. It was because of this that on Monday, when the young man knocked cheerfully on Fudge's office door and walked in with the morning papers from the Wizarding community and surrounding Muggle areas, his co-workers sniggered behind cupped hands and pressed their ears to Fudge's door.

The ever-anal assistant to the Minister of Magic strode into his boss' office with a wide grin on his face and a merry spring in his step. He took absolutely no notice of Fudge gaping at him with an expression that clearly read what in God's name are you doing here?

"Good morning, Mr. Fudge sir," greeted young Percy. "I have all of your morning papers here sir, all alphabetized, organized and ready for you perusal." He placed the newspapers on a startled Fudge's desk. Percy stepped away from the desk, clasped his hands together behind his back and awaited Fudge's words of praise, which, he thought, would be most certainly forthcoming. After all, how many administrative assistants had Fudge ever had in his employ that would actually _alphabetize _his newspapers for him? "I've even taken the liberty of separating out the funnies out of the American newspapers and throwing them away. I remember how much you _loathe_ low-brow humor."

Instead of praise, the Minister of Magic merely glowered at him and grunted something intelligible. He picked up his coffee mug and took a deep slurp.

"Excuse me sir?" Percy asked, now a little bit confused.

Fudge took another large swallow of his coffee, then stood up and leaned over his desk. "Mr. Weasley," he spoke in a tone of voice that clearly said 'I am not a man to be reckoned with', "how _dare _you walk in here and bother me before I've had my coffee? You've been working here long enough to know this!"

"I'm sorry sir," Percy said in a hurt voice. "I am aware how much you enjoy your coffee, sir, and I thought that perhaps you would enjoy reading the paper while you had it, is all."

"You think too much, young Weasley. That's the type of behavior that could get a wizard killed in the field," growled Fudge. "If you took the time to listen rather than think, you would know that I am NOT TO BE BOTHERED WHILE I HAVE MY COFFEE!"

Percy wished with all his might that he be able to find a hole to crawl into.

Fudge hadn't finished his tirade. "If you can think of a reason why I should continue to employ you without using the letter "E," perhaps I will allow you to stay on at the Ministry. Otherwise, you're fired!"

Percy began to sweat. He tugged at the collar of his work robes, which suddenly felt far too tight. He couldn't lose his job…what would Penelope say?

"Uh…I am a good…uh…work man?" he offered in a weak voice. "I am yours to control?"

"Impressive, young Weasley," stated Fudge. "You think fast on your feet. I like that in an employee. You also gave me an excellent idea for a new Ministry motto. I'll allow you to keep your job. Now get out of my sight before I change my mind!"

"Thank you, sir. Thank you for your patience with me! I swear, it shan't happen again, sir—" Percy took two large steps away from the desk.

"GET OUT!" Fudge yelled, throwing his mug angrily in Percy's direction. Percy covered his head and ducked. The mug landed on the thick, plushy carpet, bounced and eventually rolled into the corner of the office.

"Please sir, don't hit me! AHHH!" Percy cried as he stepped farther away from his employer's desk. He tripped over his own feet and fell on his bottom. He scrambled to his feet once again; shielding his face as Fudge launched another mug at him. This one smashed against the door, mere inches from Percy's face. Percy turned around, fumbled with the knob for a fraction of a second, then pulled the door open and ran out of the room in a hurry.

As he closed the door behind him, the sound of another mug hitting the oaken door and breaking could be heard. How many mugs did that man own, Percy thought wildly. He looked up. The entire workforce of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement now surveyed Percy with raised eyebrows. Percy's faced reddened as he looked around the room, painfully aware that everyone was staring at him.

"Nothing to see here! Go back to your business!" he snapped. "Mr. Fudge specifically complained about the noise out here! It's a wonder you all haven't been fired!" With that statement, he skulked off, extremely miffed.

For a moment or two all was quiet. Soon, however, the chuckling at Percy's expense began and the day continued as if nothing had happened, that is for a while.

Because what Cornelius Fudge did not know was that someone in the Department of Magical Births was about a very interesting discovery…


	3. The Department of Magical Births

**__**

"The Devil's Dilemma"

Chapter Three

"In Which Startling Discoveries are Made"

"I feel your fingers, cold on my shoulder-

Your chilling touch as it runs down my spine.

Watching your eyes as they invade my soul

Forbidden pleasures I'm afraid to make mine…

At the touch of your hand, at the sound of your voice--

at the moment your eyes meet mine--

I am out of my mind… I am out of control--full of feelings I can't define!

-"_Dangerous Game_," from the Broadway Show _Jekyll and Hyde_

The Department of Magical Births was a lesser-known division of the Ministry of Magic and was not considered to be an office with much prestige. In fact, it was so "un-prestigious" that its tiny working office was in the very bowels of the main Ministry building —next to the boiler room, which was a place where even angels feared to tread; it was a lesser-known division of the Ministry of Magic which very rarely drew much in the way of attention. Unlike the high-profile events that took place in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement or the Department of International Magical Cooperation, the proceedings in the Department of Magical Births were rather ordinary. The only people with vested interests in the workings of the office were Wizarding schools, eager to hear about the newest magical births so that they could add the babies' names to their mailing lists, and red-faced wizards who wondered if improperly cast contraceptive charms had truly rendered them daddies.

The sole interesting thing about the Department of Magical Births was the process in which newborn Witches or Wizard's names were recorded in the Official Birth Record. Whenever a child of wizarding blood was born, a special enchanted quill, made of solid gold with a diamond nib, levitated away from its customary spot in a well of crimson ink to a beautifully ornamented record book. As if manipulated by an unseen hand, the quill wrote the baby's full name in elegant script in the next available spot. The parents' names were also recorded. After this was completed, an employee would send out a form letter of congratulations to the proud parents. Some days were rather full--fifty or so births- - but other days were positively boring with not a single birth to herald!

On this particular day, Thaddeus Davies, the department head, sat at his unkempt desk with his feet crossed on the desktop and his chair balancing rather precariously on its back legs, slowly sipping his tea. He was reading the latest edition of _Which Witch_ and trying in vain to finish the crossword. His assistant, Loretta Pritchard, was busily typing out a congratulatory note to the parents of Ira Coombs, born June second in Gloucester. A huge stack of birth notices was heaped next to her typewriter, nearly obliterating the tiny woman from view.

Mr. Davies looked up from his crossword and over to his hard-working assistant. "Loretta, what's a seven letter word meaning 'hairy?' Third letter's 'R' and the seventh letter is 'E'."

Loretta paused and chewed her lip thoughtfully for a few seconds. "Hirsute?"

Mr. Davies chewed the tip of his quill contemplatively. He took another sip of his tea as he stared at the empty squares in front of him to see if Loretta's suggestion had any merit. It did. "Ah, there we go!" Thaddeus scribbled in the letters with a grin of victory.

Loretta rolled her eyes as she glared at her immediate supervisor. "You _do_ realize that, with two of us typing, this job could be completed in no time," Mrs. Pritchard said with a trace of annoyance. "Honestly, we're nearly out of the month of July and I'm still up to my elbows in June births! There's no way I can keep up with this on my own." She stood up and gestured expansively at her desk to emphasize her point.

"Don't blame me, Loretta, blame the quill," Thaddeus said without looking back up.

It was no secret amongst those who had spent a while in the Department of Magical Births that the enchanted quill was ready for retirement: enchantments only lasted so long and, more often than not, recently, the revered quill refused to log names in the book, much to the chagrin of everyone in the department. As a result, when repairs _were_ made to the quill, there was often a backlog of names several feet long, which would then create a lot of work for employees. Members of staff tried to petition the Ministry for a new quill, but their request was denied due to budget cuts. Added to that, there was the fact that Cornelius Fudge was extremely tight with the Ministry's money.

Typical lazy man, Loretta thought. Can't be arsed to do _anything_! Mrs. Pritchard decided that the time had come to play her trump card: "Well if you're not going to help me, then expect to have to pay me an unheard of amount of overtime," Loretta said resignedly. "I'm going to be here until He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is defeated typing out these announcements." She turned back to her typewriter with a tiny smile. Three seconds and Mr. Davies will be typing right along beside me, she thought with a mental chuckle.

Sure enough, her statement caused Thaddeus to take notice: overtime was the cardinal sin of the Ministry of Magic. Old man Fudge would be all over him like a cheap set of robes if he submitted an overtime slip. He decided that it might be prudent to assist his co-worker.

Thaddeus stood up, stretched, and walked across the room. He picked up a stack of announcements and set himself up at the nearest typewriter. He did not notice the cleverly disguised bark of laughter coming from Loretta's desk, which she managed to pass off as a sneeze.

Loretta reached for another notice and read it aloud: "Andrea St. Mulligan, daughter of Miles and Sarah St. Mulligan of Ballantrae. I wonder if Miles St. Mulligan is the same St. Mulligan who finished Hogwarts with my Stanley last year?"

"Wouldn't know. Isn't Stanley playing for the Wasps now?" asked Thaddeus as he worked on the birth record for Eva Spencer, daughter of Horace and Julia Spencer of Sutton-in-Ashfield.

"Not at the moment," lamented Loretta with a sigh. "Stanley straddled his broomstick a little too quickly in practice and took a large splinter a bit too close to the nether regions for comfort. Damned Cleansweeps!"

Mr. Davies crossed his legs uncomfortably at this bit of news. Splinter injuries were the bane of any Quidditch player worth his salt; they were the worst kind of injury to incur while riding a broomstick. Most women, for all their sympathetic words and soothing gestures, did _not _comprehend just how painful they could be.

"He's on the disabled list until further notice--refuses to have the splinter removed by a mediwizard. I think he's proud of it, personally." Loretta placed her now-typed congratulatory note into the growing pile of finished work and reached for another one.

Placing it into her typewriter, Loretta paused to read the name of the child. Abigail Rose, born June the fourth. What a sweet name, she thought. She looked to the parent's names. The card read: "Harry and Tessa Potter, residence unknown."

__

Residence unknown? Thought Loretta. That can't be right. The quill could locate anyone. That is, of course, unless they were under some sort of concealment charm. Was the quill misfiring again? She double-checked the names of the parents. Harry and Tessa Potter. Harry Potter. Was this _the _Harry Potter? The name of the mother struck her as familiar as well, but she couldn't put a finger on why, exactly. Something about a scandal, that much she knew. It had been in all of the papers back in January but suddenly dropped out of sight, like a rock in a pond, not long afterward.

"Mr. Davies, do you remember a while back when Harry Potter was in the news? "Mr. Davies, do you remember a while back when Harry Potter was in the news? Something about him being nearly killed when a woman seduced him out of Hogwarts?"

"Who doesn't remember?" asked Mr. Davies. "Harry Potter's picture was in all the papers for weeks! Didn't you see all the articles in _You've Got to be Kidding_?The local tabloid dubbed the woman as the 'Mrs. Robinson of the Wizarding World', because she was so much older than the Potter boy was. She collapsed at her first trial and was taken to St. Mungo's for treatment. The woman managed to escape from St. Mungo's without a trace some months ago and made Mr. Fudge's division of the Ministry look completely inept when they failed to find her. Fudge was publicly humiliated at her trial, which he held even though she wasn't there to answer to the charges." Thaddeus looked as though he could barely suppress his glee and childish amusement at his statement.

Loretta smacked her forehead with the palm of her hand. "Oh, now I remember! The Oracle found her innocent on charges that she willfully intended to kill Harry. My, Fudge didn't take that well, did he?" asked Loretta.

"No, not at all," he replied with a conspiratorial smile. "The woman had public opinion on her side and it really pissed him off. People pitied her and were willing to forgive her actions after the Oracle proclaimed her innocence on some of the charges because it showed that, while she was guilty for some of her deeds, she had tried to amend things. But because she made Fudge look like a puppet leader, he made it his mission to find her and make her pay for her service to the Dark Lord."

Loretta laughed. "Well, he sort of _is _a puppet. I would hate to see him spearheading the resistance to a _real _emergency."

"Agreed," commented Mr. Davies. "Be that as it may, however, Fudge offered one thousand Galleons for her capture! So far, nobody's come forth with any information." Davies paused to take another sip of his tea. "I don't think anyone's going to either. The case is too cold and people pitied her too much to turn her in even if they _did _know something."

"There were also rumors that she was carrying Harry Potter's love child, but I don't think that could have _really _been the case. Just a nasty urban legend, if you ask me." Davies turned back to his typewriter with an air of finality and scanned what he had written so far.

I'm not so sure it was a legend, thought Loretta, if this index card is any indication."Do you remember the woman's name?" she asked.

Thaddeus Davies continued to type. "I certainly do. It was Laughlin…Tessa Laughlin. The irony of the whole mess was that she was the daughter of the Ministry's two best Aurors of all time, which made the case that much more infuriating for Mr. Fudge. If there's anything he hates more than being disturbed over his coffee, it's a turncoat. And what a turncoat Tessa Laughlin turned out to be!"

Quickly, Loretta stood up and strode over to her superior's desk. As she handed the card bearing Harry, Tessa and Abigail's name she said, "Thaddeus? I think we have something here that Mr. Fudge needs to see!"

Tessa grasped the handle to the door to the master bedroom and turned it slightly. The door opened noiselessly, sending a shaft of the last vestiges of pale moonlight streaming into the hall. She peeked through the door. Tessa saw that Harry was lying asleep in their big bed, a white bed sheet covering him to the waist, an expression of complete innocence on his face.

As she gazed upon her very young husband, Tessa's heart broke for him. Harry had put up with so much rubbish lately and a large majority of it was _her_ fault. I can't believe I let something as silly as a bunch of stupid nightmares get in the way of what should be some of the happiest times of our lives to date, she admonished herself. I was a complete fool and took everything out on him! She mentally slapped herself at her stupidity. Well, no more, she decided. Six weeks had passed since Abigail's birth and her husband needed some TLC in the worst way; she had every intention of giving it to him.

Part of her was nervous as she stood just inside the door to the bedroom. She ran her hands down the sheer, satiny fabric of the cobalt blue baby doll nightie she wore. The slinky little item had a flyaway front with only one tie holding the ensemble together and had a matching G-string too. She had purchased the item through Muggle mail order, (using an alias, of course) shortly after she married Harry, but had never had the chance to wear it because of her pregnant belly. It had looked terrific in the catalogue, but as Tessa looked down at herself, she wondered if she had made an incredibly stupid mistake in purchasing it.

Tessa licked her dry lips apprehensively. Her throat was parched, yet her hands perspired as she attempted to get up the courage to walk into the bedroom and face her beloved. A part of her felt foolish; Harry was her husband and he loved her. She knew that! But another part of her wondered what would happen if Harry took one look at her and turned her down. She had certainly given him several reasons to do so lately: she had been nothing more than a crying, complaining ball and chain for several weeks now. It was a wonder, in her mind, that Harry hadn't packed up and left already.

For the first time in her life, Tessa contemplated her dress and physical features as well. Never one to hurry out and purchase the latest robes and other Witch-related attire, she had never bothered to keep herself apprised of the most popular hairstyles or fashions. The whole concept failed to interest her, quite frankly; it had been so when she was a teenager and it bored her still. To her mind, there was a lot more in life to be focused on other than clothes, makeup and jewelry; however, now that she was married, it had suddenly become an issue. She wanted to look good for Harry, but babies had a way of changing a woman's figure and she was afraid that he would be disappointed with what he saw.

She pinched at a bit of fat on one hip and wrinkled her nose in disgust. Tessa had never been waif-like, by any stretch of the imagination, and Harry had never commented negatively toward her body…but she _had _gained forty or so pounds when she was pregnant with Abigail. She had managed to lose all but ten of them, but somehow her pre-pregnancy robes still didn't fit quite right. Would he be disappointed with her altered figure? What if he took one look at her and ran screaming from the room? There's only one way to find out, she thought as she twisted a portion of the expensive material between her fingers worriedly.

The determined woman crept on silent feet across the bedroom floor and pulled back the crisp sheet that covered Harry's body. He was completely naked underneath, as Tessa surmised that he would be; the previous evening had been unusually hot and humid and sleeping in the buff was the only way he could get comfortable, he said.

She looked at him adoringly. Despite turning seventeen, his chest was still as hairless as an infant's and narrow to boot, although it was rather well toned from the years of Quidditch. His entire body was slender and lithe and was probably going to remain that way, she thought. He was going to be the sort of man who could eat anything he wanted to and his body would always be wiry, she groused with the tiniest measure of jealousy. Meanwhile, if _I_ so much as look at a biscuit the wrong way I am going to gain half a stone. Life is most certainly not fair! Why can't carrots be the fattening food and biscuits the healthy food? What cruel and vengeful god had come up with that screwed up logic?

Dismissing her mental rant to the back of her brain to be pondered another time, Tessa sat on the bed beside Harry. She reached toward his face and placed her slender fingers in his black hair. Tessa toyed with Harry's untamable locks in a very seductive manner, allowing her fingertips to gently lift the hair from his scalp, extending the strands to their full length and letting them fall back into place. Harry stirred and sighed, enjoying the feeling of her fingers against his skin. It was rather a pleasant way to awaken.

"I'll give you three hours to stop that, Mrs. Magic Fingers," he murmured as he opened his eyes fully and stretched.

"Good morning, Harry," Tessa spoke in a low voice as she rested her loving hand on his pink cheek. She leaned over and pressed her lips delicately against his. She caught his scent--woodsy soap and just a hint of sweat--the smell of a man-child, completely pure and unspoiled. A ripple of desire coursed through her body causing her stomach to flip pleasantly as she heard him draw a deep breath beneath her and felt his arms encircle her, drawing her nearer to him. "Do you know what today is?" she asked, kissing him again.

Harry reluctantly broke the kiss. "My last day of freedom from Professor Snape?" he quipped, now unable to properly kiss her because of the wide grin which spread across his face.

Tessa laughed. It was a sound that had been noticeably absent from the house in the past weeks and Harry was heartened to hear it. "No, silly! You have another week of solace," she stated playfully, tapping Harry on the tip of his nose with her index finger, "although _that_ wasn't what I was thinking of and you know it!" She disengaged herself from Harry's embrace and sat up once again. She flashed him a pair of bedroom eyes as she reached toward the ties that bound her outer robe together. She twirled one of the ties between her fingers.

"Well then, what _were _you thinking of?" asked Harry with a degree of curiosity. He observed Tessa as she stood up next to the bed and pulled her hair out of the headband it had been in. Raising her chin a bit, she reached up underneath her nut-brown hair and flipped it so that it settled in waves about her neck.

Is there a woman alive who _doesn't _look sexy when she does that? And do they realize just how horny they make us when they do it? Harry wondered silently. He blushed furiously at the thought. Personally, he thought that they must.

"Today is somebody's birthday," Tessa said with a coquettish smile as she stood up beside the bed and allowed Harry a good look at the revealing, scandalously short, nearly see-through blue nightdress. The liquid-like fabric hugged every possible contour of Tessa's body. "As I am unable to go into town directly I am at a bit of a loss as to what to do about your birthday present," she said with a pout. "Whatever will I do?" she asked theatrically, placing one long finger to her lips. With an alluring sway of her hips, she walked over to the large bedroom window and looked out into the back garden, a tiny smile playing about her lips as she did so.

"Er…you don't have to get me anything," Harry said with wide eyes as he stared at Tessa. In the light of the window, her lingerie leaves _nothing _to the imagination, he thought, and I _like it._ No complaints here whatsoever. Harry could feel the beginnings of an erection stirring. He stood up and walked over to the window and wrapped his arms around Tessa's midsection. "You've given me so much in Abigail as it is." But, from the looks of things, you're going to give me more, he thought.

Tessa smiled knowingly as she felt Harry's body pressed to hers. The blue nightdress had done the trick and Harry was responding appropriately…verrry appropriately if his hardness against her body was any indication.

"That's piss-poor and you know it, Harry!" Tessa said as she turned around, leaned forward and traced figure-of-eight's across the plane of Harry's bare chest with her index finger. "Everyone gets a gift on their birthday. I think that it's an unwritten law!" she declared. Tessa enjoyed Harry's nearness to her…he was warm and solid against her--he was her rock. As she rested her forehead against his, she was reminded again of how much she loved him; he was her protector, her defender and her lover…and more than fit the bill for all three.

Tessa's heady perfume and close proximity to Harry drove any idea of merely shuffling downstairs to breakfast from his mind. He marveled at her softness as she wrapped her arms around his neck and nibbled on his earlobe, causing him to gasp as his insides seemed to suddenly become roughly the consistency of tapioca.

Oh, happy birthday to me, Harry thought as he placed his hands against Tessa's apple-sized breasts and rubbed the nipples through the thin fabric with the pads of his thumbs, eliciting a groan of delight from his wife. Harry fought to keep his voice on an even keel. "Tell that to Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia," he squeaked. "I honestly…can't remember a birthday…where I…even got a lousy…card!" Tessa's warm breath against his neck and her fingernails digging into his back was all he could concentrate on. Coherent sentences were rapidly becoming an issue.

Tessa was aghast. "Surely you're joking! Did they make you a cake, at the very least?" she whispered.

"If they did, I never saw it."

"My poor little man!" Tessa exclaimed as she kissed Harry's neck. "Those days are gone for good, Harry! I'm going to make you a cake today and you're going to get a present. I daresay it's going to be a better gift than anything your Aunt or Uncle could ever get for you!"

Harry's hands left Tessa's breasts at that moment and reached to her shoulders. Slowly he allowed his fingers to move underneath the delicate cloth of her camisole. His hands could not seem to get enough of her; he touched her everywhere, his fingers trailing down her arms, across her hands to her stomach and waist and eventually her hips. Tessa moaned slightly and placed her hands on his firm bottom as his fingertips moved ever so slowly downward…

Tessa's lips moved up Harry's neck and rested just underneath his chin. The hairs on the back of Harry's neck stood up and a ripple of goose bumps popped out on his arms as she gently sucked at his skin.

"Hey, hey…I do have to go back to Hogwarts next week, you know!" Harry protested. "I don't need another physical abnormality for people to stare at! I wouldn't exactly be able to explain it as a bite from Hedwig!"

This comment caused Tessa to laugh against him. "Sorry! Trouble is," Tessa whispered as she pressed her lips against his earlobe and caressed him with her hands, "what _does_ one get for the Wizarding World's newest fully-fledged adult, who has saved the world on more than one occasion?"

Harry pulled Tessa as close to himself as he could. "I can think of something I'd like," he murmured as he eyed her appreciatively, "but you're the only one I want it from."

"Do you really, Harry?" Tessa looked down at herself and blushed.

"Yes…why wouldn't I?" Harry asked.

"Well…I just thought you'd be disappointed with me…I'm bigger than I used to be and I've been nothing but a bitch to live with these last few weeks. I don't see myself as a real turn-on for you, Harry." Tessa lowered her head slightly and looked up at Harry's kind face.

"You're always going to be a turn-on for me, Tessa, even if you weighed fifty stone! You always will be to me," Harry answered. "You've given me a beautiful daughter and proven your love to me in so many ways. Come here," he said softly as he drew her into his arms. He gently traced her lips with his thumb. Tessa leaned up to him so that the couple's lips just barely touched "Could I get you in a big red bow?" Harry asked as he kissed her softly. "Actually, I think I'd prefer you without the bow. Saves time, you know."

Harry's fingers fumbled clumsily with the delicate lace straps that held Tessa's camisole together. After a small amount of cursing, coupled with passionate kisses that took Tessa's breath away, Harry managed to peel the garment away from Tessa's shoulders. His eyes drank in the sight of her as she stood before him wearing nothing now except for the G-string, with her face flushed and eyelids lowered seductively.

Tessa fell towards him in contentment as Harry's lips traveled from her own to her chin and to her collarbone and then to her breasts. His tongue flicked at her nipples, causing her to cry out. His kisses against her neck and collarbone were hard and passionate; his hands roamed all over her body as if consumed with a lust for her that truly had to be indecent and wrong, but in his mind was not only right, but also necessary.

"I want you so badly it hurts," Harry groaned as he enveloped Tessa in his arms and crushed his lips to hers. He felt her hands begin to stroke him lightly and it was all he could do not to explode right then and there.

Harry's hands moved to the space between her legs. He could feel her damp with desire against his fingers and his arousal rose even higher; so frantic was he to have her at that very moment that he hooked his thumbs in the waistband of her G-string. When it did not come off as quickly as he wanted it to, he merely tore it away from her body in his desperation to get to her.

"You're so sexy," he voiced huskily. "This might be stupid to say, but you're even more sexy to me now that you've had Abigail! Your body is so amazing!"

Tessa's excitement rose as she heard Harry's words in her ear. "Fuck the living daylights out of me, Harry," Tessa pleaded, her eyes glazed with desire for him. "I want you inside of me as deeply as you can possibly get. Do it now…do it quick!"

"I intend on doing just that," Harry voiced, his words low in his throat. He pushed her gently against the bedroom wall.

"But the bed is just over--" Tessa began.

"No. Here…" Harry urged. His eyes were closed and his breathing was heavy and unsteady as he enjoyed the feeling of Tessa's hands moving slowly over the length of his penis, her fingers warm against him, her grip firm. "Against the wall…"

"That's rather kinky!" Tessa said in a flirty tone.

"It's _my _birthday! And you're one to make a comment on kinkiness," Harry chided as he looked down at Tessa's busy hands.

"Touch¾ ! You can have me any way you want me, Harry," Tessa murmured into his neck, her words raw with emotion. She lifted her head and pressed her lips to his. He enveloped her in his arms and she plunged her fingers into his thick hair; he picked her up and she wrapped her legs around his waist, kissing him the entire time as he leaned her against a wall for support.

"God, Harry!" Tessa cried out as he immersed himself deep within her. She had craved reassurance from Harry that she was still sexy and beautiful, at least in his eyes, and he was now proving it very convincingly. Her fingers entwined themselves behind his neck so that she could gain a bit of support. She rocked herself against him and met him thrust for thrust and for a very long time there were no words from either party as both worked to fulfil a basic human drive. As the lovers worked their way into an extremely erotic frenzy, both Harry and Tessa slid to the floor in a tangled mess of arms and legs and remained there for quite some time, getting to know one another once again.

And there, gentle reader, we shall leave our lovers because, at least for a short while, there was no discernable conversation….

Tessa loved giving Abigail a bath. Bath time with her daughter was a bonding time: a time when mummy and daughter could spend time getting to know each other. Abigail Rose Potter was Tessa's beacon of light as of late. She undressed her daughter slowly, placing little kisses all over her shoulders, chest and tummy and gently rubbing her skinny arms and legs. As she did this, she reflected on how life had changed since Abigail's arrival.

At first, the concept that she was largely responsible for the welfare of a human being as tiny as Abigail had been a bit daunting. Tessa truly wished that her mother were still alive to help her out. As it stood presently, she and Harry were trying to learn everything there was to know about parenting as they went along. Sometimes they were successful and sometimes not. Harry, for example, in a move that Tessa still sniggered over, had put Abigail to bed for the night without a nappy the previous week. Two hours after his unfortunate error, he was removing soiled sheets from the bassinet and running a load of washing at 11:30 PM.

Not that Tessa herself was without fault, of course. After one particularly long shot without sleep (due to Abigail's incessant need for constant feeding that week and not a desire to remain awake to keep a certain demon away), Tessa stumbled blindly to the refrigerator and pulled out what she thought was an ordinary container of milk. She drank it in huge thirsty gulps and would have continued except Harry chose that moment to step into the kitchen, see what she was doing and cry out with disgust, "That's _breast milk, _Tessa!" Tessa gagged and spat the mouthful of liquid into the sink.

Despite these mishaps, however, Abigail was a delight and a joy to her mother and father and, the ignorance of her parents notwithstanding, was thriving in their care. Every day was a new challenge; every day that passed taught the young couple something new. Babies were full of surprises and never boring. If Tessa gained nothing else by the whole experience, she had learned that she had a lot to learn.

After testing the water with her elbow, Tessa placed Abigail into her bath seat, picked her up and lowered her into the tub. "Here you go, sweetie! Doesn't it feel good to have a bath and get all clean?" Tessa asked her tiny daughter in a loving voice. Abigail was surprised at the wetness of the water and her limbs jerked reflexively as she made contact with the liquid.

Tessa smiled. "Now, now. The water's not that cold!" She filled a small container with water and gently poured it over Abigail's head, making sure to place the side of her hand on the child's forehead so that the water would not run into her eyes. "Doesn't that feel heavenly?" she cooed. "We'll get you all shampooed and soaped up and then we'll rub some lotion on your little back and tummy and you'll smell soooo nice!" Tessa lifted Abigail's tiny feet to her lips and kissed the small toes.

Abigail merely looked at her mother as if to say, someone's having way too much fun at my expense!

As Tessa carefully lathered the baby's head, making certain not to put too much pressure on the 'soft spot' where Abigail's skull had yet to fuse together, she mentally thanked the Almighty that she seemed to be over the worst of the baby blues. It had been a rough several weeks since she had come home with the baby. She shuddered to think how nasty she must have been to Harry during that time period. She hadn't allowed herself to sleep and it had nearly driven both she and her young husband insane.

However, nearly a month had passed since the night Harry cast a peaceful slumber charm on Tessa, permitting her to sleep without dreaming. It had been a month since she had been pulled into Wormtail's fantasies unwillingly. Because of Tessa's fears that the nightmares would return, she refused to tempt fate; instead of sleeping at night she was now catching sleep in small shifts during the day. Her rationale for this was simple: most people, Wormtail included, she surmised, slept at night; if she slept during the day and stayed awake at night, it would significantly reduce the chances that Wormtail would be able to invade her subconscious!

So far, the plan had worked marvelously; Tessa had not been bothered by nightmares in any way. With an adequate amount of sleep came an increased amount of lucid, logical thought, so it wasn't long before Tessa was able to entertain the notion that perhaps--just perhaps, mind you -- the concept of Dreamfasting had been some sort of elaborate dream induced by drugs at the hospital and exacerbated by her own irrational fears. After all, Wormtail was one of the last people she had seen before she fell into her coma; he would have been prominent in her mind at the time, therefore lending a large amount of credence to the idea that his presence was caused by something other than magical means.

In fact, she could almost laugh about the whole thing now. Imagine, she thought to herself, being able to coerce somebody into doing things they normally wouldn't do just by dreaming about them. The very idea was preposterous! Still, the idea made her just uncomfortable enough that she chose to remain on her sleep schedule a little while longer, just to be on the safe side.

Harry wasn't very keen on her new sleeping pattern, but Tessa knew that he had a hard time finding major fault with it if, indeed, Tessa was getting the rest she needed. She knew that he was simply glad that the woman he loved and had married was finally beginning to behave like a normal human being again. Tessa was glad too. She smiled on occasion now; she felt like she was growing stronger each day; she was even able to cast some basic cleaning charms again and the house did not look quite so "lived in" anymore. Things seemed to be looking up for both Tessa and her young husband.

After rinsing the baby shampoo from Abigail's thick black hair, Tessa swaddled the shivering, slippery baby in a soft white towel. She then carried her to the nursery, where she blew raspberries against the little girl's belly. She sprinkled talcum powder and rubbed lavender lotion onto Abigail's skin, warming it in her hands first. After placing a clean nappy on the baby, Tessa dressed her in a downy pink sleep suit and ran a brush through the infant's untamable hair. She hummed a little tune as she placed a tiny pink bow in Abigail's hair.

"There you go! Don't you look pretty?" she asked jovially as she lifted Abigail to the mirror. She took one of the little girl's hands in her own and waved it in the mirror. "Hi! Look at this beautiful girl! Who is mummy's girl? Huh? Who is mummy's girl? Abigail is mummy's girl!" Tessa babbled nonsensically, as all parents occasionally do with their very young children.

Abigail said absolutely nothing, content to stare at the baby looking back at her in the mirror. She leaned forward slightly and her breathing grew a bit more rapid. Tessa smiled. "You like that little girl in the mirror, don't you?"

Tessa cuddled the little girl close and breathed in her clean scent as she sat down in the rocking chair. "Let's do lunch, Abigail," she offered as she unbuttoned her blouse and prepared to feed her. "Daddy's still asleep and I don't wish to wake him. After all, it _is _his birthday and he should be able to sleep in if he wants to."

Tessa thought back to just a few hours earlier, when she had given him her little "birthday gift", and smiled. She was still a little bit sore and stiff from the activity; Harry had been unusually demanding with her; not rough, exactly…maybe 'inspired' was a better word. Still, both had enjoyed the sex and Tessa felt, for the first time since she had come home from the hospital with Abigail, that she and Harry were going to be all right.

The two sat contentedly together in the nursery for some time. Tessa rocked gently and sang to her daughter as she suckled. The warmth of the summer sun through the windowpane felt heavenly on Tessa's back and, after several moments of quiet bonding time, mother and child fell asleep.

__

Tessa stood before her secondary school orchestra, with her conducting baton in one hand and the score to the "Chorale from Jupiter" by Gustav Holst in the other. She regarded her large group with a glare that would have frozen molten lava, even on the hottest day.

"Frankly, I fail to understand how it is that after four years of music lessons none of you are comfortable playing in the key of A-flat Major. Honestly, ladies and gentleman, it shouldn't be a foreign language!" Tessa slammed her score onto the podium and flipped a few pages. "Trumpets, B-flat is first valve, not _second. Think 'flat first' and that should alleviate a lot of your problems. You should have learned that in the first week of lessons. Lord knows I taught it!"_

As Tessa glowered angrily into her music score, she heard the low sound of a man's laughter coming from behind her. Her eyes left the score and stared straight ahead, her facial expression cantankerous. Whoever is daring to laugh at me is going to rue the day that he interrupted my class, she thought. The individual behind her chuckled once again and the hairs on the back of her neck rose precipitously. She knew that laugh.

Please don't let it be who I think it is, she prayed fervently. Slowly, she turned around. No such luck.

Wormtail stood in the doorway to the music room, a strained smile on his face and a clarinet in his hand. It appeared to Tessa that he had lost a considerable amount of weight in a short period of time; his robes were dirty and dusty and dark circles were visible underneath his eyes. He was also pastier looking than usual.

Despite these strange things, however, she soon found out that his attitude was still as caustic and sarcastic as it had ever been. Can't I have a normal dream where I'm standing naked in front of a big crowd, just like everyone else, she thought miserably. Why does this annoying cretin continue to bother me?

"Because it's extremely e--entertaining," Wormtail informed her. "Teaching the orchestra Tessa?" he asked as he walked toward her.

"I see that, once again, the obvious is not lost on you!" Tessa said with a snarl. "Truly, you are a credit to your species. Your intelligence never fails to impress me," she commented acidly.

Wormtail looked past Tessa to the students sitting silently in their chairs behind her. "Can I play the clarinet?" he asked.

"I don't know. Can you?" asked Tessa. Her students snorted with laughter behind her.

Wormtail looked mildly affronted at her question. "It's u--up to a lovely teacher s--such as you to educate me," he said in a quiet voice.

At the mention of "lovely," Tessa's students began to laugh. She shot them a venomous look meant to scare them into silence but it wasn't successful. Eighty-five students were having a hearty laugh at her expense and it was the fault of Peter Pettigrew. Turning back to him, she spoke under her breath, "Take your clarinet and shove it up your a--"

"Ah, ah, ah…not in front of the k--kiddies!" Wormtail raised one metallic finger in the air and waved it slowly back and forth. "You don't want to l--lose your job! Are you t--trying to tell me that you can't teach a willing student how to play a c--clarinet?" His eyes sparkled merrily, despite their redness, as he asked this.

"He's got you there, Miss Laughlin," stated her principal bassoonist.

Without turning to the student, Tessa retorted with, "Alex, one more word out of you and I'm going to tell the whole class how I watched you dig around in your nose for ten minutes while I was working with the percussion section last week."

Alex, the bassoonist, immediately reddened and closed his mouth.

"That wasn't very nice, Tessa," Wormtail said as he looked past her and at the bassoon student. "You've scarred that young m--man for life!" Wormtail walked over to Tessa and lifted his lips to her ear. Very quietly, he said, "You were c--certainly able to teach me how to play the p--piano. Ah, I remember how soft and sexy your h--hands felt a--against mine…never mind h--how exceedingly appropriate the choice of teaching material was…'Pop Goes the W—Weasel', after all. "Wormtail's breath against Tessa's ear tickled annoyingly.

Does your mind ever rise above the gutter, you sadist prick? Tessa groused silently.

"Rarely where you're concerned, Mrs. Pettigrew," Wormtail said aloud.

"Stop calling me that," Tessa said in a low, barely controlled whisper. She kicked him in the shin. Wormtail gasped and bent forward, clutching at his leg and scowling up at her.

"Ow! That was d--downright rude!"

"Whoops. Foot slipped," Tessa wisecracked innocently. She heaved a mighty sigh. "Sit over there," she voiced as she pointed to a chubby girl who sat on the end of the second row. "If you so much as breathe wrong, Wormtail, you're going to think you were born _in detention!"_

Tessa immediately regretted her choice of words as she watched Wormtail flash her a thousand- watt smile. "You'd like that, wouldn't you?" she muttered irritably.

Wormtail's smile was now so wide that he looked as though he had just won the lottery.

"Stop smiling like that. It's creepy." Wormtail fashioned a sober expression and ambled to his seat.

Tessa turned once again to her class. "All right, class, let's give a warm welcome to our guest today, Mr…er…Pettigrew."

"Good afternoon, Mr. Pettigrew!" chorused the class as one.

"Go to measure ninety-one," Tessa said as she picked up her baton. "One, two, ready…"

"Psyched you out didn't I?" Peter quipped as he snapped his fingers and the students evaporated in a puff of mist.

"You think you're so incredibly droll…" muttered Tessa as she stepped off the podium and walked away from him.

"I admit to f--feeling somewhat let d--down, Tessa. You know, for someone who advocates music for everyone, you weren't t--too keen on letting me play."

"That's because you're a hopeless twonk, Wormtail!"

"Well, p--perhaps I would be l--less of a 'twonk,' as you refer to me, if you'd slip me a few extra house points now and then." He smiled then. "Perhaps something in the way of a practical lesson…as in 'hands on?'"

"God damn it, I have **had it **with your sleazy remarks and crass jokes!" Without warning, Tessa screamed. She raced toward a surprised Wormtail and shoved the little wizard toward the door. Wormtail wasn't prepared for her sudden attack and consequently crashed to the floor and skidded on his backside several feet. Tessa stepped next to him and prepared to deliver a sharp kick to the ribs. Before she could connect, he looked up at her with a devilish countenance.

"_I can see straight up your skirt. Nice beaver."_

Tessa stepped away quickly and locked her legs tightly together. "You nasty, horrible, ugly thing! You have a face that would stop a clock!"

Wormtail smirked. "Being the c--consummate diplomat that I am, I shall only say that when I look at you, Tessa, time stands s--still!" he voiced as he sprung to his feet.

Tessa took a deep breath to try and calm herself down. She wasn't about to allow a simple dream to irritate her this badly. "You're not really here, Wormtail! You're just a figment of my imagination…you can't really hurt me!"

"Oh, but I can." Wormtail laughed with malicious glee as he placed his arms behind his back and bounced on his heels like a child who was impatiently waiting for a cone of ice cream. "I admit to being d--disappointed in your current attitude, Tessa my sweet! How can you possibly b--believe that our Dreamfasting wasn't real? Haven't I proven myself to you…in more ways than one?" He smirked at her as he blew her a kiss.

"That doesn't work with me anymore. Nothing more than coma-induced fantasy, Wormtail," Tessa answered in a dismissive voice.

"Then why are you dreaming of me right n--now? You're no longer in a coma-induced state. I saved your life, remember? My blood runs through you, Tessa!" Wormtail turned sharply away from the woman and threw open the door of the classroom. He stood in the doorway as he spoke.

"If you need further proof that what you're experiencing is one hundred percent real, look no farther than your chest of drawers. You used to own a very sexy, very black, very skimpy article of clothing." He grasped the door handle and began to close it behind him.

"Wait!" Tessa pondered Wormtail's statement. She knew exactly which article of clothing he was referring to, which startled her a bit. "Wait! I still do own it," she said slowly. " I wore it for Harry after we were married, and--Hey! How do you know about that?"

Wormtail stepped back into the classroom and stood directly in front of Tessa. He fished around in the pocket of his robes and pulled out the item in question. He met her eyes as he shook the garment out and held it up for Tessa to view. He watched as the blood slowly left Tessa's face; she stood before him as white as a sheet.

"It looked lovely on Melissa when she wore it for me. You know, w--when I closed my eyes and ran my hands across her supple, t--tantalizingly hot body, it almost felt like you." Wormtail gave a saccharine smile. "She even let me call her by y--your n--name."

"Oh God," Tessa cried out, fresh tears in her eyes. Her skin began to crawl as she pieced together what Wormtail had done. She pulled at her hair. "You didn't…please say you didn't…"

"OK, I didn't," Wormtail said. His flippant answer and an angelic-looking face covered up his mortification, at least for the moment; he hadn't wanted to share this information with Tessa, but he had to convince her that what she was experiencing was real… especially if he was going to try to warn her again about Voldemort.

He sauntered once again to the entrance of the classroom. At the last minute, he turned around, his facial expression somewhat sad…

"I…uh…am concerned for you, Tessa. Follow the instructions in the l--letter! Please d--do the right thing." As Wormtail said this, he suddenly looked behind him, a panicked expression on his face. He seemed to see somebody Tessa could not. "No! Please…I haven't—"

"What?" Tessa asked, now thoroughly nonplussed.

His body became unfocused and blurry, a swirl of colorful dots resembling a George Seurat painting. "I n--never…please, I d--didn't tell her--" He turned back to Tessa, his face now desperate, all frivolity wiped from his face. He reached toward her. "He's coming Tessa!"

Before Tessa's confused eyes, Wormtail suddenly disappeared with a pop. He was gone.

Tessa ran to the door exited by Wormtail and looked through it, first to the right and then to the left. "Do the right thing? What do you mean by that? Tell me what you meant by that! What letter?" For the first time since the nightmares had begun, Tessa wished that Pettigrew would come back. She did not know how to call him back, however, and this was maddening for her.

It was later in the day that Tessa decided that she had to quell her curiosity about what Wormtail had mentioned in her latest dream. The concept that Wormtail's visits to her as she slept weren't merely bad dreams; that he was truly searching her out with the intent to cause her potential harm frightened her. Harry had gone into town to pick up more formula and nappies for Abigail (the child went through more of _those _than Tessa thought humanly possible) and Abigail was asleep in her little bassinet. Tessa had the bedroom to herself and ample time to look for a piece of revealing black lingerie. It was the way she wanted it. She didn't want Harry looking over her shoulder or asking questions. Questions would lead to difficult answers, which would undoubtedly lead to more questions that Tessa did not want to answer. Any way she chose to format her responses might cost her marriage, she thought.

Tessa stood before her chest of drawers, her mouth set in a firm line of concentration. Her mindset was determined, yet anxious at the same time. Her hands shook uncontrollably as she placed them on the smooth wooden surface and her fingertips left shadowy prints on the veneer. She stared at the bottom drawer for several moments, but did not kneel down to open it. In her stomach, a twisted knot of fear coiled like a king cobra ready to spring. If the drawer revealed what she feared it might, she thought that her life as she knew it would be over. Had Wormtail been telling the truth about the lingerie or was his story merely an elaborate and annoying dream? Could she afford to sleep peacefully at night again or would sleep continue to be elusive and unsatisfying for her?

She fell to her knees, took a deep breath and opened up the drawer. She peered inside. The contents of the drawer looked perfectly ordinary: there were a few carefully folded nightdresses, a pair of socks and a small brown photo album that Tessa knew contained photos of her parents. She picked up the treasure and traced the gilded edging lovingly. How she wished that her parents were still alive and with her: she could tell them anything and they would help her…even if what she told them might hurt. They always seemed to have the right answers. She wished she had them too.

Tessa placed the book to one side and began to rummage through the clothing. At first she was careful not to place the items in disarray or unfold things unnecessarily. But, as she pawed farther and farther into the drawer without finding what she was looking for, she became more desperate and less inclined to care about a mess. Finally, she was throwing clothing and small items not only out of the bottom drawer, but also out of the other three as well. Her heart was pounding like a jackhammer as she tossed things wildly about the room. Her breath came in tight gasps as the contents of the drawers became less and less and still she hadn't found what she was searching for.

As each drawer was emptied, Tessa's eyes began to frantically scan the contents of the floor. She got on her hands and knees as she roughly pushed items aside, rendering the floor in absolute disarray. It _must_ be here…dear God, if I ask for nothing else, please let me find it…

As the moments wore on and Tessa made her way through the underwear, shirts, socks and nightclothes that littered the floor her, mood became more and more despondent. Tears rolled unnoticed down her cheeks as the comprehension dawned that she wasn't going to find the little black number that she wore for Harry just after they were married. She had worn the item only once and Harry had enjoyed it very much. The tiny scrap of cloth was see-through except in very strategic areas and it was the prettiest piece of clothing that Tessa owned. Rather, had owned.

Tessa pulled her knees up to her chest and buried her head in her arms as she began to cry. Wormtail had not been lying: he had stolen the lingerie during his stint as Edward McMurray and now possessed it; he had forced a prostitute to wear it for him and they had—no, Tessa, she thought, don't go there.

The thought of the demon owning such an item, and doing unspeakable things with it in her name, caused bile to rise to her throat. She felt dirty and used. She knew she could not live with the torment any longer. If she were indeed a Dreamfaster, as Wormtail indicated, she realized that he could beckon her to his dreams any time he felt like it for as long as he was alive.

The downstairs door slammed suddenly, causing Tessa to raise her head in a panic. Harry was home! She looked about herself at the mess on the floor. He couldn't see this, she thought. He's going to think I've gone positively crackers! As quickly as she could, Tessa leaped to her feet and began to pick up the clothes. She threw them onto the large bed and folded as if she were on fire.

She heard footsteps on the stairwell now, coming closer and closer. The doorknob to the master bedroom turned. Tessa spun around and faced her husband, a pair of knickers clutched against her chest. "I didn't hear you come in!" Tessa lied.

Harry surveyed the mess in front of him with one hand on his hip and the other one in his hair. His facial expression was one of puzzlement. "Tessa, what are you doing?" Harry's voice carried a note of concern. "What _is_ all this mess?"

"Oh, I am looking for something," Tessa answered in as cheerful a voice she could muster. "I didn't find it though."

"What were you looking for?" Harry asked. "I could help you look if you'd like."

"I wasn't looking for anything special, sweetheart. It doesn't really matter," Tessa answered. Her voice shook ever so slightly as she said this. Her eyes did not meet Harry's; rather, she continued to look about the floor and bed for a piece of lingerie she wasn't going to find.

"You are obviously upset, Tessa," Harry said. "You're shaking. Now tell me what's wrong!" He held out his arms to her in an attempt to pull her into his arms, but Tessa turned stubbornly away.

"Nothing is wrong, Harry. Why do you always suspect that there's something wrong with me?"

"I think that the first giveaway is the fact that your eyes are red and your cheeks are tear-streaked!" Harry cried. "Something happened to you today, didn't it?"

"I don't want to talk about it."

A red haze of anger clouded Harry's vision momentarily. "Why am I not surprised?!" He said in a voice that rose in volume with rage. "So help me, I've tried to be patient with your unpredictable mood swings. I've been comforting, understanding and helpful. But, Tessa Potter, you're starting to PISS ME RIGHT OFF!"

Tessa did not look at Harry, choosing instead to continue to fold the clothes on the bed. Harry grabbed her by the arm and spun her around. "Look at me when I'm talking to you!" he snarled.

Tessa's mouth opened in an "o" of stunned shock. "Get your hands off me!" she cried, attempting to wrench herself from Harry's grasp.

"Not until you tell me why you're so upset!"

"Harry, I've told you already! I was looking for something and I didn't find it. What I was looking for had sentimental value for me…that's why I'm crying."

"What did you lose?"

Silence.

"What. Did. You. Lose?"

"It was nothing!" Tessa struggled to free herself from Harry's grasp. "It's not important--"

"Talk to me!" Harry screamed.

"No! I don't have to do anything of the sort if I don't want to!" She twisted in his arms, desperate to get away from him and run…anywhere. He couldn't know the shame she felt.

"What are you hiding from me?" Harry growled. "I can see it in your eyes. What is going on?"

Tessa bowed her head and said nothing.

"Talk to me or I get Dumbledore over here and he'll_ make_ you speak!"

For a split second, Tessa looked up, thoroughly shocked and frightened at Harry's outburst. Then an invisible wall slipped over her blue eyes and her face reverted back to a noncommittal expression. Harry's idea had merit…

"Fine, go ahead and get Dumbledore, Harry," Tessa hissed.

Harry didn't expect this response. Tessa had called his bluff, much to his consternation. He paled.

"You _want _to see Dumbledore?" Harry asked, scratching his head. "What do you need to see him for?" he asked, irritated that Tessa obviously did not want to discuss her problem with him.

"I want to talk to Dumbledore about my nightmares," Tessa answered. She looked at the floor for a moment. "They're becoming…well…let's just say that they're becoming more and more real each time I sleep and I'm beginning to have trouble discerning fact from fiction. I think Professor Dumbledore might be able to listen to me with a more open mind than perhaps you will."

"Tell me about the dreams, Tessa," Harry said. "I'm your husband, and I think I deserve to know."

"No, Harry, you wouldn't understand…" Tessa began.

Harry became vexed. "I wouldn't understand? Why not, Tessa? Is it because you think I'm stupid?" His voice was a bit shrill as he said this.

Tessa crossed her arms over her chest. "And this, Harry, is precisely why I don't want to talk to you about the terrors. You overreact to everything. I'd like to have someone listen to me without fear of reprisal!" She watched as Harry's face fell dejectedly.

"You don't love me anymore, do you?" Harry's question, simple and direct, now voiced audibly. Tessa's face crumpled once again into a torrent of tears. "That's right, I don't think you love me anymore. I know about the ring!"

Tessa looked at him, confused.

"That's right," he snarled. "I know all about the ring. When you went into labor, mine glowed at the Quidditch match. I flew straight home as soon as I saw it! Funny thing is that, when I got home, it wasn't glowing anymore. And can you imagine _why?_"

Tessa's eyes widened. Harry thought she didn't love him because of the ring? Oh no!

"Harry, wait--" she tried to interrupt him, but Harry was in no mood to be interrupted.

"I'll tell you why! I found my token for you in the sink! I mean, you didn't even bother to merely throw it in the bin, where I may never have thought to look. No, you decided you'd just place it in the sink as a twisted little joke." Harry crossed his arms over his chest. "Look, Harry, I've had enough of you. I don't love you anymore. I'm running off with Edward, so don't bother to come and find me—"

"Harry, that's not true at all!" Tessa shrieked.

"Do you know how close I came to writing you off as a lost cause that day?" Harry asked. "You took my love and threw it in the sink! I hated you in that moment, Tessa. So help me, I was _trying _to be a good husband to you and you were probably laughing at me behind my back the whole time."

"No, Harry! I did nothing of the sort!" At that moment the wail of Abigail could be heard from the nursery. Neither parent paid her any mind. "That ring was in the sink because W--hey, where are you going?"

Harry turned away from the inconsolable woman and marched over to the closet. Throwing open the door, he grabbed a suitcase and threw it onto the bed. He began to shove clothing inside it blindly, not bothering to properly pack.

"What are you doing, Harry?" Tessa whispered.

"I'm doing what I should have done a long time ago," Harry answered stiffly. "I'm leaving."

"_What?"_

"Your hearing's perfectly fine, Tessa," Harry said. "I've had it with your high and mighty attitude and your secretiveness. You'd rather talk to Dumbledore about your problems than with me, which proves to me that you think I'm too immature to help you through them. I'm nothing but a sexual aid to you, and I have had enough!" Harry snapped the lid on the suitcase shut and brushed past a sobbing Tessa. He moved quickly through the hall and down the stairs, with Tessa on his heels.

He reached the kitchen door and turned the knob in his hands. Tessa grabbed him by the robes.

"Please don't leave me…us," she pleaded imploringly. "Think of your daughter! I--I--I will tell you everything!"

Harry whirled around. "Too late for that, sweetheart," he answered, his eyes blazing with fury. "I will be at the Burrow with Ron. Don't even bother trying to get in touch with me. I might decide to come back, _eventually_, but right now I need to cool off and think."

"Harry--the rings, you don't understand, I'm trying to--"

Harry's lips were set in a firm line of stubbornness. "There's that phrase again. 'You don't understand.' Tessa, _you're _the one who doesn't understand. You still haven't figured it out yet." He turned away from her and stepped out the door. "For someone as smart and logical as you are, you can't see the forest for the trees." The door closed behind him with a click.

Tessa sank into a chair at the kitchen table, her heart in her throat. Harry had left her, quite possibly for good. She honestly thought she was going to vomit. She was, for all intents and purposes, alone in the world, save her daughter, in a house that she couldn't leave for fear of being caught by the Ministry and taken to Azkaban. She was a prisoner in her own home and helpless to do anything about it.

Or was she?

Abigail continued to howl, startling Tessa out of her irrational thoughts. She stood up and trudged slowly up the stairs to the nursery. She entered the room and picked up her little girl.

"Oh, Abigail, I'm sorry that daddy and I woke you up," she said as she cuddled the wailing child. She held the child in her arms for a long time, pacing back and forth and rubbing the baby's back. "Shhh…there, there, sweetie…mummy's here."

Abigail continued to cry.

"Are you hungry?" Tessa asked. "Do you want something to eat?" She sat down with Abigail and attempted to feed her. Abigail turned away from Tessa's breast and continued to wail. Tessa sighed in frustration.

"What is the matter?" she cried. "I don't know what you want!" She stood with Abigail once again and made to change her nappy. However, Abigail was dry. Tessa heaved a mighty sigh as she continued to carry Abigail in her arms, trying in vain to soothe her.

I've ruined everything, Tessa thought. No, forget that--Wormtail's ruined everything. Tessa balled her hands into fists. The slimy bastard was going to pay, if she had any say in it…


	4. In which Harry goes to Ron's house for s...

**__**

"The Devil's Dilemma"

Chapter Four

"In Which Harry Learns that Marriage Can be Difficult"

The sweetest woman in the world  
Could be the meanest woman in the world  
If you make her that way.  
You keep hurting her  
She'll keep being quiet,  
She might be holding something inside  
That'll really, really hurt you one day…

-_Thin Line Between Love and Hate, _Iron Maiden

It was raining.

Not just any rain, mind you: this was a _soaking_ rain; a rain that fell to the earth in large, fat, pregnant drops; the kind of rain that felt like a punch when it splashed against an uncovered and unprotected face. This, combined with the humidity of the air and the yellowish-white zigzags of lightning that occasionally snaked across the sky, would normally cause any sane man caught in it to turn around, head back into his house and curl up with a good magazine. Perhaps he would engage in some physical love with the wife…anything, just so long as they were warm and dry.

But not Harry Potter. Oh no, not Harry. Despite being cold, wet and somewhat chagrined that he had spoken so harshly to Tessa, Harry was too proud to walk back into the house. He had spoken his piece and shown Tessa who wore the trousers in the relationship and he wasn't about to lose face. She was going to have to start treating him with respect if she ever wanted to see him again, he thought.

Wow Harry, you chose a miserable day to decide to leave your wife, the boy wizard thought huffily as he looked to the sky and winced as the drops slapped his face like a thousand small hands. He hadn't thought to bring his heavier cloak and his wand was packed somewhere in his hastily packed suitcase…towards the bottom, he believed, and he wasn't about to try to dig it out; he had neither the time nor the inclination to do so.

As the rain drenched his black locks, pasting them to his head, Harry glanced back at the Tudor house. The lights were still on downstairs, throwing beams of golden light into the back garden. He supposed that Tessa was still hoping that he would come back inside…hoping that he would come back to her. That particular thought sent him back into his childishly angry mode once more. Bloody hell, not tonight, Harry thought to himself. He needed time away…away from _her_ and away from his crying baby. She should understand. She would _have _to understand. He was only seventeen—too young to be taking care of a baby. He needed his space. She was older and more knowledgeable of the workings of the world.

On some small level, Harry knew that he was being grotesquely immature. It had required _both _Tessa and himself to create Abigail and it was harshly unfair to saddle Tessa with the burden alone. But maybe being away for a couple of days will help me clear my head, Harry thought. I can be a better husband to her if I'm rested. She'll be thrilled with that, right?

Yeah, his brain demurred. Leaving Tessa alone with a small baby despite the dangers of the Side of Darkness discovering her will really cause her to leap into your arms with delight! Try as he might, (and he was trying quite hard) Harry was having a hard time justifying his departure from the house and with each passing moment he felt more and more foolish.

It wasn't that he didn't love Tessa anymore; he loved her very much, and the baby too for that matter. What he was sure of was this: had he stayed in the house much longer, he would have been angry enough to warrant exchanging words with Tessa that would have been rather hurtful. He didn't want to do that, even though her words to him had stung quite a lot. Maybe it's true what they say; Harry thought…marriage is a lot like a coffin and children are the nails that seal it shut!

Harry prepared to Apparate to the Burrow, not knowing exactly what he would encounter when he got there. Better have a good story, he thought. Ron was the only Weasley who knew that he was married and a father and that's the way that things had to stay for the foreseeable future. He stepped behind a tree and Apparated out of the back garden. Seconds later, he stood in front of Ron's house, soaked to the bone. He raised his hand and knocked.

The door opened. Mrs. Weasley stood in the entryway, a dishcloth in one hand. When she saw Harry standing on the porch, her eyes widened in surprise.

"Harry, dear! For goodness sakes, do come on in out of this terrible rain!" She grabbed hold of Harry's cloak and literally pulled him into the house. Harry stood on the rug just inside the doorway, puddles beginning to form by his feet as he dripped. "Ron!" Mrs. Weasley called up the stairs, "Harry's here! Bring down some towels, dear, he's positively drenched!" She clucked over her new charge like a mother hen caring for her chicks as she helped Harry out of his outer robes.

Ron's red head appeared in the stairwell, his facial expression one of complete and utter surprise. "_Harry's_ here?" Moments later, Ron bounded downstairs, a bundle to towels clutched in his hand. "Here, mum," he offered, thrusting the towels into her hands. As Mrs. Weasley continued to pull Harry out of his wet things and placed the warm, fluffy towel around his shoulders, Ron caught Harry's dejected-looking eyes with his own round ones. He raised one eyebrow. Harry inclined his head ever so slightly in Mrs. Weasley's general direction and shook his head slightly. Ron seemed to understand the gesture and did not speak.

"What brings you here on what has to be the most depressing-looking night of the season?" asked Mrs. Weasley jovially as she towel dried Harry's hair. "Nobody should be venturing outside on a night like this. Honestly, I think our weather gets worse every single year…" She continued to ramble as she conjured up a cup of hot chocolate with a flick of her wand and handed the steaming, frothy treat to Harry, who took it and sipped it gratefully.

"Um…" Harry didn't rightly know what to say to her. The thought of outright lying made him feel lower than a worm. Molly Weasley had been nothing but kind toward him for as long as she had known him and was a bit like a mother figure to Harry; it felt wrong to tell her something that was utter fabrication. She was staring at him, awaiting an answer. What could he say? "I--"

Ron saved Harry from his moral dilemma. "He owled me, mum, last week and told me that his Aunt and Uncle were giving him permission to stay here until the start of school," Ron lied easily. Harry looked at him appreciatively. Apparently, Ron had no qualms about lying to his mother at all. Harry grinned.

Mrs. Weasley embraced Harry warmly. She looked up to him with a welcoming smile. When did Harry get to be so tall, she wondered. "Well, we're glad to have you, Harry. Would have been awfully nice of Ron to let us know you were coming so we could have got out your bed!" She shot Ron a dirty look. "I suppose you boys just want to talk anyway. Why don't you set up a sleeping bag, Ron, and let Harry take your bed?"

"Fine with me!" Ron turned and began to head up the stairs. On the third step he turned around. "Coming, Harry?" he asked.

"Yeah! Thank you for the drink, Mrs. Weasley," he offered Ron's mother, giving her the half-finished mug of chocolate.

The boys trudged upstairs, saying nothing. Ron pulled the door to his bedroom open and Harry stepped through.

"All right," Ron said when his bedroom door closed behind Harry. He pulled a faded-looking orange sleeping bag with the Chudley Canons logo on it (a speeding cannon ball with two connected 'C's' emblazoned across it) and laid it out on the floor. "We both know that you haven't been anywhere near the Dursleys. Something's up with you, and I want to know what it is. Now, tell."

For a few moments, Harry ignored his best mate and looked about the room. It was the epitome of teenaged boys' rooms everywhere: the room looked like a bomb had recently struck it. Dirty clothes were scattered everywhere; comic books (wizarding ones and Muggle ones alike) littered the floor. Posters of Cannon team members adorned the walls. As he looked to Ron's unmade bed, Harry was fairly certain that he saw a recent issue of _Playwizard _peeking out from behind Ron's pillow. Upon closer inspection, Harry saw that indeed he was, in fact, completely correct. A buxom, raven-haired witch wearing nothing but a pair of tassels and a thong winked suggestively at him from the cover of the publication, across which was splashed the title of the feature article (which, as we all know, was why wizards bought the rag anyway), "_Everything You Wanted to Know About Engorgement Charms (but were afraid to ask)." _Harry picked up the magazine and shot Ron a questioning look.

"I know what you're thinking. Sod off, Harry," Ron said, looking embarrassed. "Besides, Miss July was worth the price all by herself."

Harry flipped to the centerfold and his jaw dropped. Miss July was definitely a credit to her gender; long black hair, smoldering gray eyes and posed in a position that Harry was fairly certain had to require a touch of acrobatic skill to pull off as successfully as she was. She blew Harry a kiss. "Hermione would be thrilled if she knew you looked at this sort of stuff," he commented dryly. And I'm certain that Tessa would be doing cartwheels if she knew _you _were looking as well, the sensible part of Harry's mind offered. Immediately Harry closed the magazine and blushed.

"Well, I wouldn't need to look if Hermione were a little more open to the idea of--" Ron's face flamed as he caught himself. "Hey, wait just a bloody minute here! We're not talking about me tonight. You're the one who came to _my _house all wet and looking like you've been kicked repeatedly in the manhood. What's going on? Did Tessa throw you out?" Ron's voice was concerned as he asked this.

Harry glanced nervously around the room. He did not want to be overheard. "Where's Ginny, Percy and the twins?" he asked in a conspiratorial whisper.

"Ginny's asleep, I think," Ron answered in a low voice. "Percy's not here--working overtime. He's planning on buying an engagement ring for Penelope to give her for Christmas and needs cash fast." Ron looked about the room and seemed to discover then and there that he probably ought to clean it up a _little_; after all, Harry was a guest. He reached for his wand and began to send papers and books whizzing around the room and piled them neatly into a corner.

"Good for him," Harry said with a small smile. He sat on the bed and laced his fingers behind his head.

"Good for _us _you mean," Ron replied. "Honestly, that bloke is so anal that he could shove a lump of coal up his arse and shit out a diamond in a week or two, what with his love affair with cauldron bottoms. I've heard enough about _those _to last me three lifetimes! Penelope can have him. That is, if she can stand him."

Harry laughed aloud at this. The mental picture alone was enough to cause him to snicker; the part about the cauldron bottoms was the icing on the cake.

"Fred and George are on a double date in Hogsmeade tonight. Fred's with Angelina and George is with the Guatemalan delegate to the International Confederation of Wizards. He met her through Percy, actually. It was a bloody riot when he introduced her to mum and dad. She doesn't speak a word of English…not that that's going to be an issue with George later, if you know what I mean." Ron waggled his eyebrows suggestively.

Harry did. He also realized just how far out of the loop he was as far as Ron was concerned. Ron's relationship with Hermione was deepening and Harry was uncomfortably aware that, due to his current circumstances, he had missed out on a significant time in Ron's life. Life was going merrily on for everyone around Harry; meanwhile he seemed stuck in quicksand--not quite drowning yet, but not too far from it. It was a depressing thought.

"You want a Fizzing Whizbee?" Ron asked conversationally as he reached into his desk drawer and pulled out several of the multi-colored confections.

"Lovely!" Harry smiled, thankful for a tiny respite from his thoughts.

"Incoming!" cried Ron. Harry opened his mouth wide and Ron attempted to lob one of the candies into his mouth. He missed by several inches.

"Chaser material you're not," Harry said as Ron tried unsuccessfully twice more to make contact with Harry's open mouth. One Whizbee hit the wall, split into several pieces and fell behind the bed; the other one got lost amongst the bedclothes. "Come on, Ron, you're not even close."

"I know, I know. And with a mouth as big as yours you'd think I would be a shoe-in!" Ron exclaimed. Harry closed his mouth and threw a pillow at Ron, laughing. He searched through the bedclothes for the intact Whizbee to no avail.

Ron watched Harry search. "You know, there are days when I really miss Scabbers," he said with a hint of regret. "He was always good at finding sweets and cleaning up my messes." Ron handed Harry a Whizbee and Harry took it. The sweet bonbon seemed to levitate in his mouth. It was very sour and Harry's cheeks burned a little due to the tartness.

"So, why are you here with me and not with your wife and child?" Ron asked. "You two seemed so happy together and after the problems with Tessa and the birth--"

Harry cut his friend off. "I'm tired. I can't do this, Ron…I can't do it," he mumbled. "Tessa's not the woman I married anymore. It's almost as if she's gone insane! She doesn't sleep, except for three or four hours a day and at really odd times. I worry about the baby…what's going to happen to her if Tessa falls asleep when I'm not there…dreams…I don't know what's going on but I can't seem to help her." Harry knew that he was talking fast and furious and that Ron probably had no idea what he was talking about but he felt the need to get his weight off his chest.

Ron confirmed Harry's thoughts by speaking. "Slow down, Harry," his friend said. "I don't understand what you're saying."

Harry tried to compose himself. "I shouldn't be here…I should have stayed with her. We had a row, Ron…a bad one. She thinks I'm stupid."

"Did she actually say that?" Ron's eyes were wide.

"Well, no," Harry admitted, "but she may as well have."

"So what makes you think she thinks you're stupid?" Ron asked.

"I--I don't know." Suddenly Harry felt very, very foolish. He worked over his response to Ron's question in his brain, but the more he tried to think of a way to articulate it, the more stupid it sounded. 'Well, Ron, Tessa's having these nasty nightmares but doesn't want to discuss them with me and now I'm throwing a hissy fit over it? Meanwhile she gave me what has to be the best birthday present I've ever received, bar none, this morning.' The more Harry thought about it, the stupider he felt.

"I am just tired, I suppose. Having a baby is a lot more work than I thought it was going to be," Harry said. "I don't have anyone to talk about it with, either."

"Hey, thanks," Ron said dourly. "Meanwhile, here I sit."

"I didn't mean it that way, Ron," Harry replied. "You've been great. It's just that I wish I had someone to talk to who has had experience with this. Tessa's behavior in the last month has been really weird. She cries a lot and doesn't sleep very much. Sometimes she acts like she's afraid of her own shadow. She carries her wand around the house with her all the time, like she's afraid she's going to be attacked or something! It's getting better, or at least I thought it was. Today when I came home from the shops, I went upstairs and she had torn the bureau apart. Looking for something, she told me. I offered to help her and she said not to bother and that it wasn't a big deal. But she was crying, Ron." Harry raked his hands through his hair. "She had these tears coming down her cheeks and I know that _something _was haunting her but she won't say what."

"Weird," Ron said with a pensive frown. "Maybe she doesn't want to bother you. Maybe she's afraid she's going to hurt you somehow. Have you thought to talk to Sirius or Dumbledore?"

"I owled Sirius several weeks ago, but I haven't received an owl back yet," Harry answered. He looked at Ron, shamefaced. "I actually threatened to tell Dumbledore what was going on. I told Tessa that he'd force her to speak. She called my bluff, Ron. She wants to talk to him and not me. If that doesn't confirm my suspicion that she thinks I'm a complete dunce, then I don't know what does."

Ron gave a low whistle. "I don't know what to tell you Harry."

"That's fine, Ron. I just had to get it out to someone. I've seen nobody except the local shopkeeper since bringing Tessa home with the baby. Maybe I've just been without contact with other people for so long that things that shouldn't bother me are." He smiled. "Maybe a night away from Tessa and the baby is all I need."

Ron frowned. Running away from problems was not the way that Harry usually handled himself. Something was up with his best mate and his wife…something more than Harry was willing to let on…

"Well, if you were that upset with her, maybe it wasn't such a bad idea to leave. You don't want to say something to her you're going to wish you hadn't."

Harry nodded in agreement.

"You love her, Harry. I remember how you looked in the delivery room when you weren't sure she was going to live or not. You looked about one hundred years' old that day. You have too much vested in Tessa to leave her over some dreams Harry. Abigail needs _both _of her parents, not just one. I don't profess to know everything about love and marriage and all of that; hell, I can't even get underneath Hermione's blouse, but I do know that you love Tessa and she loves you."

Harry looked to his friend with wonder. "I am impressed that something that adult-sounding came out of your mouth, I really am." He sniffed and wiped an imaginary tear from his eye. "My ickle friend is growing up..."

"Poke it, fuckwit," Ron said in a dismissive voice, but was bursting with pride on the inside. He decided that the time had come to change the subject entirely. "Want to look at the new Nimbuses?" he asked as he pulled the _Quidditch Affectionado _from his desk drawer.

Harry's face lit up like a Christmas tree. He had the same magazine at home. "Yeah," he said. "Let me just let Tessa know what's going on so she doesn't worry."

It pleased Ron to watch his best friend give him his first real smile in months. "Write Tessa a note and let her know you're ok. We'll send Pig."

"Nah. He's small but he's a trooper. Besides, Errol only does local deliveries now." Ron opened up his desk drawer and pulled out some parchment and a quill. He handed them to Harry.

"I do love her, you know," Harry said.

"Who?" asked Ron stupidly.

"_Tessa, _you pratt!" Harry cried.

"I know you do," Ron said. "I'm just egging you on."

"Is it all right if I stay here for a little while?" Harry asked. "I'm not ready to go home just yet."

Ron sighed. "No problem, Harry."

The day before school began was a busy day in Diagon Alley. Hundreds of students crowded the narrow pavements, each entering various shops to purchase wands, robes, books and the like. Vendors selling everything from quills that would write in any color the writer wished, to autographed photos of famous Quidditch players had opened up impromptu shops on every corner. The heavenly smells of roasting chestnuts, piping hot chips and chocolate from the restaurants wafted on the breeze. The sun shone brightly in the blue sky as three very good friends made their way through the crowds. All in all, Harry thought, it's a great day to be out and about.

Harry had been away from Tessa for three days and was feeling much more comfortable with his familial situation. Pig had returned that morning with a note from Tessa indicating that she had received his note and to do what he thought was the right thing. I am a lucky man, Harry thought. How many girls would be as forgiving as Tessa was? It was amazing, he thought, what a couple of day's rest will do. With a smile, Harry thought that he would go back home that evening. It would be his last chance to do so for a while, what with school beginning the next day.

Harry, Ron and Hermione entered the bookshop and waved to a group of fellow Gryffindors who were leaving. The little group smiled widely at Ron and Hermione, but, unless Harry's imagination was playing nasty tricks on him, the smiles given to him were considerably cooler; they were almost nonexistent.

"Dear me, look at the prices of the books this year," Hermione said in dismay as she picked up a copy of _Advanced Arithmancy _and grimaced at the price tag. "I wonder if there are any used books in stock," she added, looking toward the section of the store marked "Used Texts." She looked to Ron's red face and knew that he was thinking the very same thing.

Harry's face grew pink. Conversations about money were ones that Harry generally tried to avoid; money was not an issue for him. Thanks to his parent's successful financial endeavors during their lifetime, they had amassed a small fortune and Harry knew that he would not have to want for anything, so far as money was concerned. Harry would have been happy to give some Galleons to Ron, so that he could buy books without having to resort to tattered seconds like he did in so many instances, but he knew that Ron wouldn't have taken the money under any circumstances. He silently went about his business of buying the texts that he was going to need for his classes. As he took his heavy stack to the till to pay for them, he brushed past a Gryffindor third year he could not recognize by name and smiled vaguely at him. The smaller student merely scowled.

What is going on? Harry wondered as he paid the cashier. Why does everyone seem to be in a rotten mood? Have I done something that I don't know about?

Harry's suspicions that fellow students were upset with him were confirmed without a shadow of a doubt when the trio walked into the Three Broomsticks later in the day. The small pub was packed with students. As soon as the patrons got a look at Harry, the noise level dipped considerably for several seconds, but soon enough the noise level went back to normal. Harry could feel the beginnings of a blush grace his features. He searched the room quickly, hoping to find somewhere at the back where he and his friends would attract less attention. In the far corner sat Neville Longbottom, Pavarti Patil and Dean Thomas, drinking butterbeers and eating chocolate frogs. Perfect.

Harry opened his mouth to call to them, but Ron beat him to the punch. "Oi Neville!" Ron shouted over the din of the busy establishment as he pulled Hermione along with him through the crowd. Harry followed closely behind. "Room for us?"

Neville looked to his three schoolmates with a smile, but the grin faded quickly when his eyes settled on Harry.

"There is now," he said quietly. "I'm leaving. I have to go buy a new cauldron." Neville stood up and brushed by the trio, his eyes on the floor. Pavarti and Dean didn't bother to even make an excuse. Mumbling hellos, the couple picked up their butterbeers and headed for the exit.

"What is the matter with them?" wondered Hermione as she watched the group exit the restaurant.

"I dunno. Neville said something about cauldrons," Ron said absently. He looked at the table, now completely empty. "Well, at least we have a place to sit." Harry, Hermione and Ron sat down at the table. As they did so, Hermione, the transcendent lover of anything having to do with studying launched into a conversation about class schedules.

"Looks like we all have Potions, Transfiguration and Defense against the Dark Arts together this year," she commented, giving Ron and Harry their class schedule. "Meanwhile, while you two are dealing with animals in Care of Magical Creatures and sleeping through Divination, I'll be taking Advanced Charms and Ancient Runes." She brushed a tendril of bushy hair that had escaped her ponytail out of her face. "Honestly, you two really ought to have put more care into the classes you chose at the end of last year. Where are classes like Divination going to get you in the real world?"

Ron shot a glance at Harry and rolled his eyes. "She's mental," he mouthed to Harry, who sniggered.

The waitress came over to the table in that moment and took their orders. All three ordered extra large tankards of butterbeer.

"So, Harry," Hermione said conversationally, "do you plan on playing Quidditch this year?"

Harry nodded. "Definitely. Why wouldn't I?"

Hermione reddened slightly. "I would have supposed that…you know, circumstances being what they are you might take the year off and focus more on your studies."

Harry's voice was low as he responded. "Hermione, I have a baby, I'm not _dead_. Quidditch is something I enjoy and I'm not about to give up on things I enjoy just because of a baby. Nothing's changed in that department."

"Yeah, Hermione," Ron added. "Give him a break! He probably needs Quidditch for relaxation!"

Ron's girlfriend shook her head at the boys' ignorance. "Oh what a tangled web we weave when we're incredibly naïve," Hermione paraphrased. "I would think by now, Harry, you'd have a concept of just how much work a baby can be."

"I can handle it," Harry assured her. "I handled it last year and I'll handle it this year."

"But Harry--last year you didn't have a baby to care for. Tessa was merely pregnant. And your marks weren't exactly superb. If I hadn't--" Ron shot Hermione a warning glance and shook his head. Hermione took the hint and stopped chatting mid-sentence.

At that moment, the waitress brought the trio their butterbeers. She smiled as she placed a foamy tankard in front of Hermione and Ron, but fiercely slammed Harry's down in front of him. She turned with a flounce and walked away before Harry could say anything.

Harry gripped his butterbeer in his two hands and frowned. "Have you noticed anything, er…off about the way people are treating me today?" he asked. Neither of his friends answered him, but Harry distinctly saw a look pass between the two. He decided not to press the issue.

The professors at Hogwart's School of Witchcraft and Wizardry sat in the staff room in small groups. Professors' Trelawney, Sinistra, Flitwick and Hooch occupied one table. Professors' McGonagall, Professor Vector, Professor Sprout and Hagrid occupied the other. Snape sat gloomily by himself in the corner, sipping a warm cup of coffee and scowling, as he was usually prone to do during staff meetings.

Staff meetings before the start of term were not unusual at all; Headmaster Dumbledore was rather fond of the get-togethers; he always hoped to garner unity amongst the staff. This year would obviously be no different.

Dumbledore walked into the room and, out of respect, his underlings stood up. Dumbledore gave them all a smile and motioned for them to take their seats.

"Greetings to all of you," he said with a smile. "I trust that your summers were productive?"

Some of the professors nodded in assent. One or two laughed lightly. Snape merely scowled.

"There are only a few items on my agenda today, friends, so I will make this brief," Dumbledore stated. "First of all, Hagrid, the heads of the bookstore have politely requested that you discontinue using _The Monster Book of Monsters_ as the recommended text amongst the third year students. Two of their members of staff were attacked yesterday and suffered lacerations on their arms. Frankly the bookstore owner finds the books too dangerous to be kept on the shelves."

The gigantic man shook his head dejectedly. "They aren't dangerous if yeh know how to tame 'em. If I've said it once, I've said it a 'undred times, Perfessor Dumbledore sir, yeh have to stroke 'em! It'll calm 'em down," Hagrid said in a disbelieving voice. "Why is that so 'ard fer folk to figure that out?"

"Secondly, Mr. Filch has asked me to remind the heads of house that the list of Forbidden objects has grown to over six hundred items. A list is available in his office and he requests that you discuss this list in exhaustive detail with your charges."

"That list seems to grow by leaps and bounds every year," Professor Sinistra sniffed.

"I think that Fred and George Weasley were responsible for three hundred of those items," offered Flitwick in a tinny voice. The other faculty members nodded knowingly. Many were quite pleased that the boys had left Hogwarts after seven years of pranks. Professors began to chat amongst themselves about the various stunts the twins had pulled during their time at Hogwarts. This went on for several minutes.

Dumbledore folded his hands in front of him somberly. He cleared his throat and the noise died down.

"I have one more issue that I need to discuss with you," the Headmaster said in a solemn voice. "What I must tell you needs to stay within these walls. It concerns Harry Potter."

The Professors' interest piqued; all heads turned to face Dumbledore to hear what he had to say.

The Headmaster looked around the room with a serious expression on his face. "As all of you are aware, Mr. Potter found himself in a spot of bother last year," Dumbledore said. "He, er, made some less than prudent choices in behavior with Tessa Laughlin last year. As a result of actions on parts of both, Tessa became pregnant."

The staff nodded knowingly. This news was not new. Most of the professors remembered how withdrawn and incredibly morose Harry had been last year. Dumbledore continued.

"What I am about to say next is probably going to cause many of you to become upset. However, you must know that Harry married Tessa in a private ceremony in December. I performed the rites myself." Dumbledore dropped the bombshell. "Their daughter was born in June."

A gasp echoed through the room. "Harry's _married_?" asked Professor McGonagall incredulously. "You allowed this? You supported this? That's where Harry went over Christmas break…to get married? He's lived with this secret for almost nine months?"

"Yes," answered Dumbledore. "I felt, and Harry agreed, that his marriage to Tessa would help keep both her and the child safe from Voldemort. Those who support his cause are very upset with Mrs. Potter because she chose not to deliver Harry to him. Harry loves Tessa and his daughter deeply and is willing to go to any length to protect them."

"Professor Snape sat up and tapped his fingertips together. "I certainly hope that you don't expect us to go any easier on Potter because of his sheer stupidity, Professor. I refuse to treat him any differently than I would have before."

McGonagall turned to her colleague with a quizzical expression. "Certainly, Severus, under the circumstances even you would be willing to concede that perhaps a little more leniency--"

"No, I would _not _concede, Minerva. The boy has been astoundingly foolish and I refuse to pander to his idiocy."

"But surely with the knowledge that he has a child now--" Professor Sprout cut in.

"That is not my problem," Snape said smoothly. "He's made his bed and now he's going to lie in it. Allowing him concessions based on his ignorance of contraceptive devices will do him no good in the real world."

"I could not have said it better, Severus," intoned Dumbledore. "Harry's marital status and child do _not _allow him special favors as far as homework and testing is concerned. I would, however ask that you keep his marriage a secret. I have told you this information only to help explain why Harry will occasionally be leaving Hogwarts in the evening. He will be regularly visiting his wife and daughter. Due to circumstances being what they are, Tessa is in hiding and shall remain there until I deem that it is safe for her to resurface."

The professors nodded.

"The only students who know about the marriage are Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger and that's the way I would like it to remain for the time being. I don't think I need to explain that there are those in the Wizarding World who would love nothing better than to bring about Harry's demise. I do not see it beyond Voldemort's capabilities to try and get to Harry through little Abigail. The fewer people who know about the circumstances surrounding both the child and him, the better it will be. Can I trust that all of you will keep the secret?" Dumbledore was met with a few silent nods.

"It's going to be a long year for everyone," the old man said. "Keep your ears to the ground. If you hear anything concerning Harry or the well being of his wife or daughter, do not hesitate to find me immediately. Harry's lost enough loved ones in his life; I'd rather he did not lose any more." With that statement Dumbledore left the room.

As Tessa steeled herself to begin the task of washing the dishes, she heard the front door open, then shut again with a soft click. Startled, she wiped her hands on a towel and threw it over her shoulder and into the sink. She entered the archway into the family room just as the interloper was making to enter the kitchen. As a result, she and Harry ran straight into each other. Both voiced their displeasure at the same time:

"Damn it," Tessa shouted, rubbing her cheek where Harry's forehead had made contact. "That hurt!"

"Look where you're going!" Harry already had a large bump rising on his forehead.

Then the pair's eyes met and they simply stood before one another in stunned silence.

"Hello," Harry said finally, attempting to break the ice.

"Hello, Harry," Tessa answered him. Her statement was a short one, giving away nothing. Stiff and distant, she was choosing to keep up the barriers, at least for now. "What brings you here?" Please say you're coming home to Abigail and me, Tessa thought fervently.

"I…er…I left some things here the other night that I need for school," Harry muttered. "I'll just…go and get those things now." Despite his words, he didn't move. You're so pretty in blue, Tessa, Harry thought as he took in the sight of Tessa in her periwinkle robes. They were tailored to her figure perfectly, right down to the golden braided sash around her middle. He desperately hoped for Tessa to apologize to him for her words the other night. He wanted to come home to her so badly, but he wanted an apology first. He deserved one, he thought!

He is a fully-grown man now, but he still looks like a child, Tessa thought. His hair is getting too long; it needs to be cut. His robes are wrinkled: they need to be ironed. Despite these imperfections, a surge of warmth flowed through Tessa's body at the sight of him. Oh, Harry I want to wrap you in my arms and hold you so badly. I want to be with you…the way a wife is _supposed_ to be with her husband.

"How are things at the Burrow?" she asked. "How are Ron and Hermione?"

"They're fine. How's Abigail?"

"She's fine. She just fell asleep."

Tessa looks so unhappy, Harry thought. She's still having the terrors; she's not saying so but I can see it on her face. She's more tired-looking than I've ever seen her and the black bags underneath her eyes are so dark. _Why_ is she being so secretive with me? I want to sit down with her and let her cry on my shoulder. I want to bear some of her burden. Why won't she let me do that?

"Do you mind if I just go and check on her? I've missed her while I've been gone." Harry attempted a smile. It looked a bit more like a grimace.

Tessa sighed and closed her eyes. One, two, three…

"No one forced you to leave," she pointed out in clipped tones. Her first attempt at something other than sterile pleasantries caused Harry's face to harden.

"I didn't have much of a choice, Tessa," he spoke with measured calm.

"You bloody well did; you could have stayed with us. It's bad enough that you chose to walk away from me, but your beautiful daughter did nothing to deserve what you did to her." Tessa's voice was soft, yet strained. It was obvious that she was doing everything in her power to keep her anger in check. She turned away from Harry.

"You didn't want me around."

"I never said that!" and now Tessa's voice began to rise.

"It was implied."

Tessa chose to ignore Harry's last statement. She threw up her arms as she turned to meet his gaze once more. "Harry, things have been hard for me lately. I'm cramped in this house all the time with no one to talk to except for you and Abigail. I'll probably never know a truly free existence again." She walked over to the sink. She immersed her hands once again in the warm, soapy water.

Harry stepped towards her once again. "Trying to change the subject isn't going to work, Tessa. Not being able to leave the house is not the problem here and you know it. You weren't sleeping well and you refused to talk about it with your own husband."

"That too."

"You're still not sleeping well. I can see it on your face. I just wish you'd give me a little more credit. You married me because you said you loved me. Marriage means we're supposed to share the bad things together!" Harry yelled.

"I'm aware of what marriage is, Harry," Tessa said as she placed a clean plate on the draining board next to the sink.

Harry's next words were spoken with a quiet conviction. "I'm not very old, but I know what love is. You're not letting me do what I am supposed to do as your husband! I vowed to be a good one to you on our wedding day and I am trying so hard to do that, but you're not allowing it!" Harry's eyes were sad as he looked to Tessa. "Why?"

Harry's hurt expression tore at Tessa's heart. For a moment, she considered telling him everything. But then the mental image of her kissing Wormtail, her tongue in his mouth and his hands hot against her bare skin sprang to her mind and she shook her head against the temptation to come clean. She wanted desperately to forget the whole sordid mess, but she couldn't. She didn't think she would ever be able to forget it. Tessa pulled the plug in the sink. She stared as the water created a vortex, swirling clockwise as the water drained.

"Let's just drop the dreams, Harry. They don't matter. I'll get over them in time, I'm sure," Tessa said in a terse voice. "I'm tired of arguing about them."

"Fine," Harry snapped. He exited the kitchen and stomped up the stairs. Tessa heard the bedroom door open and Harry rummaging around in the drawers. Sighing mightily, Tessa threw her dishcloth over the sink's spigot and followed her young husband up the stairs.

"Are you home to stay, Harry?"

Not now, thought Harry bitterly. You've gone out of your way to ruin my attempt at reconciliation with you. "You know that term begins tomorrow, Tessa. It's probably best if I head over to Ron's, as not to arouse suspicion. I've stayed at his home until school begins for last few years. If I don't, it's going to look suspicious. Besides," he added as he piled underclothes into his heavy cauldron, "I'm not wanted here. You don't respect me." Harry evaded her eyes and continued to pile clothing into his cauldron. "I'm sick of being treated like a child."

Tessa frowned. "It's hard to respect somebody who's behaving like a complete git!" she said through gritted teeth. "As to you being a child, I'm going to call it as I see it. If it looks like a duck, waddles like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it's a duck!" Tessa folded her arms across her chest.

She looked at her husband contemptuously. "Things get a little heated for you; you don't get everything you want and then suddenly you decide that it's time to leave those people who need you the most!" Tessa scowled as she continued her angry rant. "You don't see _me _running from the problem. You may be an adult, Harry James Potter, but your behavior of late would be immature for a twelve year old!" At this point in Tessa's tirade, Abigail began to cry piteously in the next room. Tessa left the master bedroom for the nursery, tersely muttering something about having to take care of _two _children.

Harry was furious. He had enough problems to deal with without Tessa behaving like a royal bitch goddess. Harry had left the textbooks that he purchased in Diagon Alley at Ron's house, for which he was very grateful, considering how heavy his belongings already were. He grabbed the handle of his cauldron and pulled it as hard as he could toward the door.

As he struggled with the unwieldy bundle, he became aware of an uncomfortable silence in the house. He managed to pull his school things into the hallway, then stopped and rubbed his sore hands together. The house was still silent.

.

"Tessa?" Harry called. There was no answer. She's probably still pissed off with me, he thought, and just isn't answering. "Tessa? What's the matter now?" As if he didn't know, he thought glumly. Harry stepped into the nursery. He saw Tessa cradling Abigail in her arms, tears streaming down her face as she placed kisses on the baby's head. His heart softened despite his anger with his wife. He put an arm around her. "Tessa, I would have to leave tonight even if I weren't angry," he said softly.

"Don't leave, Harry," Tessa said as she looked to him. "Please don't leave Abigail and me again. I need you. I don't want you to be angry with me. I am sorry for what I said. It was unfair of me."

For a moment, Harry was sympathetic. "Tessa, I can't stay here. I have to stay at school. People are going to become suspicious if I'm not at Hogwarts all the time. The subject of those dreams of yours isn't closed in my mind and, at some point, we're going to have a frank discussion about them. But not now...not until you're ready. I don't want to leave you angry again, either."

"Let's sit down and talk, Harry," she said softly, not looking at him. She took Harry's hand and together the little family walked out of the nursery, downstairs and into the living room. They sat down together on the sofa. For what seemed like an eternity to Tessa the two simply sat together holding hands and saying nothing. She knew she needed to placate him, but wasn't entirely sure what to say. Finally, after carefully rehearsing a decent explanation in her mind, she opened her mouth.

"Harry, I love the fact that you've been so concerned for my well-being. It's rather sweet. You've asked me a good question in why I won't talk with you about my dreams earlier; it's only right that I give you an explanation. Harry--look at it like this," Tessa explained patiently. "If you had a terrible stomachache you might tell me that you hurt, but you wouldn't expect me to examine you and prescribe you medication or pain relieving charms, would you?"

"Well, no, I suppose not. I'd see a mediwizard. But what does that have to do with--" Harry began.

Tessa interrupted him. "If you tore all of the twigs off of your Firebolt, you'd probably share that with me as well," Tessa continued. "But you wouldn't expect me to repair it would you?"

"No way," Harry answered with a small smile. "I've ridden a broomstick with you before. Almost took years off my life."

Tessa laughed. She was deathly afraid to fly and Harry knew it. He had tried to take her for a ride once; the ride had been short-lived. She was petrified of heights.

"If I had problems with my broom, I'd take it straight to Quality Quidditch Supplies in Diagon Alley."

"Of course you would!" Tessa exclaimed with a smile. "My problem is much the same. I've told you that I am having problems with nightmares but I want to share my problem with someone who perhaps specializes in the cure, as it were." She took one of his hands in hers and squeezed it. "You are the love of my life, Harry, but I really want to talk to an expert about this. It's not a question of whether or not you understand the situation, you see? My choice to not tell you about them has nothing to do with your intelligence."

Tessa's explanation seemed to have a degree of merit in Harry's mind although he thought it was twisted logic at best. "Do you still want to see Dumbledore, then?" he asked.

"I do, Harry. I really, really do."

"Then do it," Harry said with a degree of sadness. "I want you to be happy. If you want to see him, you have my blessing. He's at Hogwart's. I will begin school and when I think it's safe for you to venture out of the house, I will owl you. I will come home and watch Abigail while you take my invisibility cloak so that you're not seen. You can go to Hogwarts and speak with Dumbledore."

Tessa was on cloud nine. "Do you mean it, Harry?" she cried as she threw one arm around Harry's neck and squeezed him so hard that he could barely breathe.

"I mean it," Harry answered as he put his arms around his wife. "If you think that Dumbledore can help you more than I can, go to him. But Tessa, remember that when the time comes, _you cannot be seen_."

"I will be careful, Harry. I will not be seen by anyone." Tessa smiled into Harry's shoulder. "You are the sweetest, most understanding man I have ever known," she whispered. "Thank you."

"Anytime," Harry answered. He kissed her cheek but could not help feeling somewhat slighted, despite her kind words that were meant to comfort.

Harry placed a gentle hand on his daughter's head. "I'm going to miss you, little Abbey Road," he whispered. "Take care of your mother for me and I will see you as soon as it's safe for me to do so." His eyes sparkled with delight as Abigail favored him with a tiny smile.

"She smiled!" Harry cried. "Did you see that, Tessa? She smiled at me!"

Tessa did not have the heart to tell Harry that she could feel that Abigail was filling her pants at that very moment and was probably "smiling" at him due to gas. Instead, she handed Abigail over to her father and said, "I think it's only fitting that you spend a few quality minutes with your daughter before you leave her for God knows how long." And I get a little bit of poetic justice, she thought wryly.

Harry eagerly accepted the child, then caught a whiff and immediately held his daughter at arms' length. "Dear God, she reeks, Tessa! What have you been feeding her?" Harry stood up and proceeded to walk back upstairs to the nursery. Tessa followed, laughing the whole way.

"What can I say, Harry? She's an overachiever."

"I shouldn't have to change her!" Harry complained. "I have to go!"

Tessa whistled innocently as she strode to the dressing table and reached into the bag of nappies and pulled out a fresh one. Handing it to Harry, she exited the room without a word.

This, Harry thought, was decidedly _not fair. _"What about stone, paper, scissors?" Harry called out. "Tessa? …Can't we talk about this? Come on…Hello? Are you even listening to me?"

The only thing resembling an answer that Harry got was the sound of Tessa's laughter from the stairwell.

Harry looked to his daughter with a grim expression. "We'll show her, Abbey Road. Daddy's going to flick his wand and you're going to be clean and dry." He reached into his robes for his holly and phoenix feather wand with a smile, which turned very quickly into a frown. His wand was not in his robes!

"Tessa!" Harry called out. "Tessa, have you seen my--"

Tessa sighed as she walked back up the stairs and stepped into the doorway with a devilish little grin on her face and her hands behind her back. "Whatever is the matter, Harry?" she asked as innocently as she could.

"Do you know where my wand is? I want to use it to change Abigail!" Harry looked desperate.

"Harry, I am appalled that you would choose to use magic to change the baby's nappy. This is supposed to be _daddy-daughter _time and I'll not have you taint the bonding time that you have the potential to share because you're scared of a little pooh!"

"This has nothing to do with a fear of a little pooh!" Harry cried indignantly. "This has to do with being afraid of something vile, evil and disgusting...a _lot _of pooh!" With a large sigh, Harry walked Abigail over to the dressing table and began to undress her.

"I can't believe that these words are coming from the Boy Wonder who saved us all from the Dark Lord," Tessa said sardonically. "Thanks be to God that Voldemort is potty-trained, otherwise what _would_ we all have done?"

"I can fight Voldemort with a _wand_," Harry said pointedly.

"And you can change Abigail without one," Tessa retorted as she left the room. She closed the door behind her and snickered. Harry's wand rested in her left hand. If you're going to leave tonight anyway, the very least I can do is give you something to remember your daughter by, Tessa thought with a chuckle.

Harry's first day back at Hogwart's did not start well.

From the second that Harry stepped back into the hallowed halls of the school, he knew that something was amiss. The bad feelings he had felt in Diagon Alley the previous day came back to him in a rush as he could not help but notice that people were treating him differently. Hufflepuffs merely looked at him and shook their heads sorrowfully; Ravenclaws walked past without a second glance, with the notable exception of Cho Chang who gave him a wave and a smile. Most students seemed to think that he was invisible and the Gryffindors (save for Ron and Hermione, of course)--his very own housemates--could barely bring themselves to grunt hello.

Ironically, the only house that seemed to want to acknowledge his presence was Slytherin. Several members of Slytherin house, led by a triumphant-looking Draco Malfoy sauntered down the hallway in Harry's general direction, their swaggers pompous and their heads held high.

"Look who we have here!" Draco called out nastily so that others in the corridor could hear him. "If it isn't the one person solely responsible for Slytherin's Quidditch Cup victory last year…the infamous Harry Potter!"

"Ignore him, Harry," Hermione advised. "He doesn't know what the circumstances were!"

"You know, for ten knuts, Malfoy could have been prevented," Ron said in a sullen voice. Harry couldn't help but laugh at that.

"At least my parents could afford birth control," Draco said with an evil glare. "Your kind should have been fixed a long time ago."

"Ron is worth twenty of you, Malfoy!" spat Hermione.

Draco merely ignored Hermione's comment. "Thanks again, Harry, for the cup!" Draco continued. His boulders of friends nodded dumbly.

Harry turned to his friends. "Well, at least now I know why everyone else is treating me like dirt!" He scowled. "I just thought that maybe they'd forgotten about it by now."

"What sort of fantasy world do you live in?" Ron asked. "You were the most hated student in Gryffindor House the entire last week of school. Throwing the match cost Gryffindor the Cup!"

"I…er, had a good reason, Ron," Harry said.

"Well I know that, and you know that, but do _they_?" Ron asked as he pointed to a group of Gryffindors who passed without looking at the trio as they headed for Divination. Ron shook his head. "They know nothing. From their perspective you threw the game, simple as that."

Harry sighed. "But I didn't!"

"As your best friends, Hermione and I had to withstand the brunt of their frustration. It wasn't pretty," Ron informed him.

"I'm sorry, Ron," Harry said in a tired voice. "I didn't have a choice."

"As bad as it sounds, until it's safe for Tessa to come out of hiding and you can freely share your, er, status as a married man, you're going to have to live with their judgement. It's not going to be easy," Ron said, "but you'll have Hermione and me."

Harry shook his head slowly. "It's going to be a long year," he mused aloud. "Is it normal for a person's bones to ache when they're my age?"

Ron shrugged. He and Harry said goodbye to Hermione, who had Arithmancy class next, and made their way to the long ladder that would take them up and into the tiny classroom they dreaded almost as much as the potions dungeon.

"Remind me again of why we take Divination?" Harry asked his best friend.

"Because we were too lazy to actually put some thought into our class choices," Ron said with a sigh.

Harry climbed up the ladder that led to Professor Trelawney's classroom. As he pushed the trapdoor up so that he could climb into the room itself, his nostrils were assailed with the overly pungent aroma of roses, incense and a smell that Harry couldn't identify exactly, but he remembered having smelled it coming from his cousin's room on Privet Drive. His eyes began to water. As quickly as he could, Harry headed for the back of the classroom, where the only window was. He settled himself on a bright blue pouf and saved another one for Ron, who looked as if he were going to be ill.

"Open the window a crack, Harry! I can barely breathe in here," Ron said, gagging.

The rest of the Gryffindors slowly made their way into the classroom. With the exceptions of Lavender Brown and Pavarti Patil, both ardent supporters and worshippers of Professor Trelawney and All Things Divination, the other Gryffindors followed Harry and Ron's lead and tried to find seats as far away from Professor Trelawney's desk as they possibly could.

"Welcome, Gryffindors, to your first Divination class of the term," Professor Trelawney intoned in her normal airy voice. "We shall begin this year's work with the study of Dowsing, as my Inner Eye tells me that all of you are woefully lacking in its understanding. Alas, it is my sad duty to report that one of you shall not grasp the concept well enough to earn a passing grade and will be forced to repeat the term next year."

Professor Trelawney shook her head sadly at the thought, her huge golden hoop earrings catching the light in the room. The combination of the light from the earrings and her bug-like eyes behind her thick glasses made her look not entirely unlike a huge firefly from the neck up, Harry thought. He suppressed a chuckle.

As Trelawney made this prediction, several members of the Gryffindor contingency turned their heads sharply in the direction of Harry and Ron. It was no secret that since the professor had predicted Harry's death during his third year, the boy wizard was not enamoured with the woman. It also went without saying that, if Harry did not care for her, then neither did Ron. If anyone was going to fail the class, then _certainly_ it had to be Potter or Weasley. The boys flushed pink at the attention.

Professor Trelawney placed a large ordinary-looking cardboard box on her desk. From the box she withdrew an L-shaped piece of wood and a Y-shaped piece. She also withdrew several metal coat hangers and plastic straws. The final object she took from the box was a silver chain with a pink crystal attached to it.

"The art of Dowsing dates back many centuries. We are not certain exactly where and when it began for certain, but archaeological excavations and pictorials found in Egypt and China from 7,000 years ago show that Dowsing was being used as far back as that time period. Dowsing did not make an appearance in Europe, so far as we know, until the Middle Ages."

It has to be over one hundred degrees in here, Harry thought as he sucked on the tip of his quill. Harry knew that he could not afford to be remiss about his studies this year just because he had a new baby and a hormonal wife, so he tried very hard to pay attention to what the professor was saying, but it was difficult. Only ten minutes into the class, beads of sweat were already forming at the base of his neck and trickling slowly down his back. It tickled. He tried to ignore it as he dipped his quill into his bottle of ink and began to take notes.

"Dowsers, the proper term for people who practice the art of dowsing, look for all kinds of things. Water is usually the primary thing they are trying to locate, but dowsers also can search for oil, hidden metal, minerals, treasures and even people who are lost. Many skilled witches and wizards earn a good living by means of dowsing, even in the Muggle world. It is one of the few divination skills that many Muggles appear to accept."

Professor Trelawney picked up the L-shaped stick and held it up for the class to see. It was unremarkable, save the shape. "A person can use many different objects to dowse and be successful. One of the more popular dowsing objects is an L-rod."

Ron inclined his head so that he was very close to Harry. "Heh heh," he spoke in a low voice, "she said _rod!" _Harry suppressed a guffaw of laughter.

"These rods can be made of just about any material: copper, silver, and even wood. This particular piece is made of beech wood, although apple and alder have been used often as well. When you are using L-rods to dowse with, you will need two. I shall explain why in a moment. The rods, traditionally known as 'Wishing Rods', are formed into an L shape."

She passed the L-rod to Dean Thomas, who gave it a cursory glance before he passed it to Neville Longbottom. Neville passed it to Harry, who couldn't understand how a piece of wood was supposed to help one find something. The stick wasn't impressive, and didn't look like it would be good for anything besides being an old man's walking stick. He passed the rod to Seamus Finnegan.

"When one dowses, it is imperative that they grip the smaller of the two angles of the rod or they will not get the results they wish for."

At that very moment, Seamus Finnegan passed the L-rod to Ron, who was now sniggering without shame at his sexual innuendo. "See, Harry? You've got to _grip the rod,_" Ron voiced, running his hand provocatively over the smooth wood. "Otherwise you won't get what you wished for! I've got to let Hermione know about these," he said with a sly grin.

That did it. Suddenly the male members of the Gryffindor house who were within earshot of Ron's remark burst into laughter. The girls, who were focused on their professor's lecture, had not heard the off-color remark, looked at them quizzically.

Unfortunately for Ron, Professor Trelawney had heard it. She walked to the back of the room and took the L-rod from the red-faced boy. "Unless it is your desire to complete a star chart for every classmate in your year, I would thank you to keep your crude remarks to yourself. Ten points from Gryffindor, Mr. Weasley."

Ron mumbled an apology and the class continued.

The professor picked up a second L-rod and continued with her lecture. "Let me see…where was I? Ah yes, now I remember! When dowsing with L-rods, you will need to use two. Let us say, for the sake of demonstration, that I am looking for water. I would pick up both rods, being sure to grasp the smaller of the two angles and point them in the direction I think the water is." For emphasis the professor held up both rods in her hands, parallel to the floor. "As I near what I am looking for, in this case, water, the rods will begin to vibrate in my hand and when they're over the water, the sticks will cross." Professor Trelawney began to walk very slowly toward a basin of water that rested on a nearby table. As she got closer to the basin, the sticks indeed began to vibrate with a low hum. Pavarti and Lavender nearly fell off their poufs in their excitement. When the sticks were positioned over the basin of water they crossed, just as the professor said that they would, and both girls clapped enthusiastically. Professor Trelawney flashed a delicate smile in their general direction.

Harry was less than impressed with the display. It would have been far more interesting, in his opinion, if the old bat had actually found water that was _hidden. _Wisely, he kept his comment to himself.

"Y-rods are also used for dowsing purposes, as are pendants." Professor Trelawney picked up her silver chain with the pink crystal attached and held it up for all to see. "This pendant acts like a pendulum, which map dowsers use to look for people. We shall discuss this in more depth next week. For this week, your assignment is to construct your own set of dowsing L-rods using materials with which I will provide to you. I would also ask that you find a partner and have them hide something from you. You must then see if you can find it using your L-rods."

With this statement, Trelawney proceeded to hand out two metal hangers and one drinking straw to each student. Once everyone had their materials, the professor gave directions on how to make the rods. "Cut off the long wires at the bottom of the hangers, and bend one end about four inches, so that it makes a right angle. The small end is your handle, and the longer end is the pointer. Fit your drinking straw over the handle."

Seamus Finnegan raised his hand. "What's the straw for?"

"I knew that somebody was going to ask that question," Professor Trelawney said with a smile. "Can anyone venture a guess?" She looked about the room and was met with fifteen sets of confused eyes. Finally Pavarti Patil raised a hesitant hand.

"Wouldn't we use straws to allow the rod to swivel freely without being affected by our hand movement? I would think that a sleeve of some kind would ensure a more accurate dowse," she finished in a questioning voice.

"Excellent answer, Miss Patil. I could not have said it better myself," Professor Trelawney said with a smile. "Five points to Gryffindor!" Pavarti beamed.

The rest of the class passed fairly uneventfully, if you didn't count Neville's complete inability to follow directions, which left his hanger twisted and utterly useless. Professor Trelawney merely pressed her fingers to her temple, closed her eyes and shook her head slowly before she gave him another hanger to work with.

The bad thing about sitting next to the window in Trelawney's room, Harry discovered, was that you were going to be the last student out of the chamber when class finally ended. He tapped his foot impatiently as he waited for all of the other students to make their way to the trapdoor that led to fresh air and freedom

"What have we got next, Ron?" he asked the red headed boy.

"Potions," Ron answered miserably. "This day just goes from bad to worse, doesn't it?"

Harry nodded affirmatively as he made to open up the trapdoor and climb down the ladder. A light tap on his shoulder stopped him. He looked up and into the eyes of his Divination Professor.

"May I see you for a moment, Harry?" she asked.

Harry shot Ron a questioning glance. Ron shrugged his shoulders.

"I'm going to be late for Potions," Harry said, his voice uncertain. Ron nodded in agreement.

"How are your wife and child?" the professor asked in a kind voice.

Harry's blood seemed to freeze despite the heat in the room. "How did you know--"

"It's not always pleasant, Harry, having an Inner Eye. Sometimes the Fates tell me things that I wish I didn't know…sometimes terrible things. It leaves me in rather a quandary…do I tell what I have seen or do I let nature take its course?" she asked rhetorically.

Harry fought the urge to turn around and leave immediately.

"That, and your wedding ring is hanging out of your shirt."

Harry looked down at his chest and saw, much to his horror, that the professor was telling the truth. Had anyone else seen the ring? If so, did they know his secret?

As if Trelawney knew what he was thinking, she said, "I doubt it, Harry. But I would be much more careful about concealing your ring in the future."

Harry reddened as he placed the ring underneath his shirt. "Thank you," he said.

"Don't thank me just yet, Harry. I just wished to save you some trouble. I have seen that there are a number of disturbing things in your future for you to deal with without adding one more."

Harry didn't know what to say to that. He stared at the professor and waited for her to continue. Several seconds passed. She's going to milk this for all it's worth, isn't she, he thought with a slight shake of his head. Fine, I'll play to her. "Well? What do you know that pertains to me exactly?" Harry asked.

Professor Trelawney looked at Harry as if she had just witnessed a kitten being kicked. "Heed the warning in the letter."

"The_ letter?_" Harry scratched his head. "What does that mean?"

"This is just it, Harry. I have absolutely no idea. I was hoping that perhaps you could tell me," Professor Trelawney said in a defeated-sounding voice. "This is the information delivered to me by the Fates. I consulted your cards this morning, hoping to discover some elaboration on the statement but was unfortunately unable to detect anything else."

"Did you see anything else I should know about? I mean, besides the business with the letter?" Harry asked.

The waspish professor looked at Harry sorrowfully. "I think that you should go to your Potions class now. Professor Snape is going to be dreadfully angry that you're late already," she stated.

"You saw something else, didn't you?" Harry asked. "What did you see?"

"You don't want to know, Harry. It's best that you don't," Trelawney said in a sad voice. "Sometimes it's better _not _to know what the future holds, because you still have the power to change things, and—"

"What did you see?" Harry asked again. He was becoming more livid with each passing second.

Professor Trelawney sighed.

"I saw a child…"

"I already _know _that I have a child," Harry said in an irritable voice. "Why is this news?" he asked peevishly.

Ron smiled at Harry's statement. Harry put on a rather good show of acting all upset about this, but Ron knew how proud Harry was of Abigail. He talked her up almost constantly when others were not around.

"I saw a child…a child who initially will bring you the utmost joy, yet the child is not…hmmm… " Trelawney looked up at the boy wizard and sighed. "The child is not…uh…the child is not…"

"Not what?" Harry asked.

Professor Trelawney looked at Harry with large, spooky-looking eyes. She glanced first at Ron and then at Harry. "Uh…Harry, dear…the child is not…is not…a girl. That's right!" she smiled as if pleased with something that Harry did not understand. "The child is not a girl!"

Harry snorted. "_That_ was the big prediction? You really need to work on your technique, Professor. I have a daughter. I think I would know if she was a boy." He turned away from Professor Trelawney and opened up the trapdoor. To Ron he whispered softly, "I'll give her extra points for originality, though. She really had me wound up for a minute," he said as he beckoned a flabbergasted Ron to follow him down the narrow ladder that led to the main corridor below.

When the trapdoor closed behind the pair, Professor Trelawney sighed. She should have taken more points away from the boy for cheek, she thought with a grimace, but if the Fates had informed her correctly points would be the very last thing on Harry's mind soon enough. She didn't have the heart to tell him what she really saw; she didn't know how badly he would have taken it. If giving Harry an inaccurate prediction and becoming the butt of his jokes for a few days was the price she would have to pay, then so be it. She didn't want to be the person who was going to have to tell him the terrible news.

Of one thing however, Professor Trelawney was certain; she needed to speak with the Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry right away.

"I suppose you're wondering why I've called you all here," said the Minister of Magic in a mysterious voice. He took a sip of his ever-present cup of coffee and cleared his throat. His best Aurors stood around the desk and looked confused.

Cornelius Fudge pushed his chair away from the mahogany desk and stood up. He rifled through a pile of papers in his 'IN' tray with the hand that wasn't holding the coffee and procured a small index card with some words printed on it. "I've asked you here because of this," he announced as he held up the card. "Do any of you know what this is?" He paused and waited for an answer. Finally a balding man with several medals of commendation on his robes spoke up.

"I believe, sir, that you're holding a birth announcement."

"Excellent, Warrington. Years of Auror training and field work have served you well," Fudge said with a smile. Warrington and the other Aurors looked at each other nervously. They didn't know whether they should laugh at their boss' statement or keep up their sober appearance. A couple of the agents looked at their shoes; one cleared his throat.

Thankfully, the moment was short lived. Fudge turned away from the small group, placed his hands behind his back and walked to his picture window. He looked outside for a moment. "I pride myself," he said, "on keeping things peaceful in the Wizarding community. Wherever Dark Magic presents itself, I immediately send out a team of Aurors to squelch the problem…eradicate it if necessary." He nodded to himself. "Yes," he continued. "As long as I have been Minister of Magic, the Dark Forces that once threatened our peaceful existence have been kept at bay and that's the way I wish it to remain."

More than one Auror cringed slightly at this statement. The general consensus on the street was that the law-abiding citizenry was becoming more and more concerned that those who supported the Dark Lord and what he stood for could lead a coup at any time.

These fears were exacerbated by the events of the Triwizard tournament that had been held at Hogwarts the year before last. Since Harry Potter had met up with the Dark Lord (who had attained a new body, but this was classified information--most of the general public did not know this little detail) rumors had abounded that it was only a matter of time before Voldemort became hugely powerful once more.

The Minister turned sharply to his underlings and placed the index card on his desk. He pulled his wand from the top drawer and held it in his left hand while tapping the palm of his right hand with the tip in an almost impatient manner. "There was one person who escaped me this past year," he stated in a soft voice, "and that person was Tessa Laughlin. At least, that's what we've thought all this time. It turns out that Tessa Laughlin no longer exists."

"Did she die, sir?" asked Warrington. "Has her body been discovered?"

"No, Warrington. To the best of my knowledge, the woman is still alive. However, she is no longer Tessa Laughlin. Gentlemen, it appears as if congratulations are in order for the Hero of the Wizarding World. It appears as if Harry Potter has recently become a father. Harry Potter is a father, and the traitor Tessa is the mother of his child."

A collective gasp echoed throughout the room. One of the other Aurors whispered, "It can't be…Harry Potter, a _father_? He's only sixteen!"

"Seventeen, Stebbins," corrected Fudge. "He turned seventeen mere days ago. And the rumors are true. He has a daughter, born on June the fourth. Her name is Abigail Rose and the mother's name is Tessa Potter. It seems that our young Hero made an honest woman of her and married her before the child was born." The short man bristled at the thought and, without any warning, he slammed his wand onto the desk.

"Laughlin and Potter made this entire Department look like a bunch of incompetent _morons_!" cried Fudge. "Meanwhile, they're out there somewhere playing house and thumbing their noses at us. I hear the voices on the street. 'Let Tessa go free--she's atoned for her sins'. Never mind the fact that she very nearly sold out Potter to Voldemort!"

"But Harry apparently loves her if what you say is true," advised another Auror. "Wouldn't it be best to just leave the couple alone? I--I mean, public opinion is strongly in Ms. Laughlin--excuse me, Mrs. Potter's favor. And public opinion and confidence in the Ministry being what it is currently, sir--"

Fudge was around his large desk and standing before the unfortunate Auror in less than three seconds. "What, pray tell, are you suggesting? Do I hear the beginnings of a plea to spare the traitor a life sentence in Azkaban? Does nobody recognize that the girl very well could have brought the _entire wizarding world_ to its knees in one night of heated passion?" Fudge grabbed the man by his robes and shoved him hard. The tall, brown-haired man stumbled backwards a couple of paces and regained composure.

"I have a duty as the Minister of Magic to bring those who seek to destroy the peace we've worked for all this time to justice. Tessa Laughlin-Potter is no different to any Death Eater we've managed to capture. I repeat for emphasis, she is _no different_." His voice was harsh and his eyes flashed with malice, as he looked each of his subordinates in the eye. "Forget that she is Michael and Sierra Laughlin's daughter. Forget that she's captured the heart of a _mere child_. Children are easily swayed; easily led by those they _trust_." For a moment the face of Albus Dumbledore loomed in Fudge's mind, which left a bitter taste in his mouth. He didn't doubt for a second that Albus had played a significant role in the young wizard's decision to wed the criminal. Fudge flicked his wand and muttered, _"Aparecium Tessa Potter." _A large photograph of the woman appeared in thin air. It was a photo of Tessa taken with her parents. She was wearing a set of soil-streaked green robes and holding a trowel in one hand and a potted plant in the other. She waved cheerily at the camera.

"Tessa Potter is officially Public Enemy Number One. I want her captured and the kiss to be performed as soon as it can be arranged. The Wizarding world deserves to sleep a little bit safer and we're going to make that possible."

"Where is the woman hiding?" asked Stebbins.

Fudge walked back around his desk and picked up the index card. "It seems as if someone close to the couple--Dumbledore, I believe, though I cannot prove it--has placed protective wards and concealing charms around newlyweds' domicile. The enchanted quill in the Department of Magical Births was unable to pinpoint a location."

"Then how are we to--" began Stebbins.

Fudge waved him silent. "I plan a different approach in finding Tessa." He paced behind his desk as he talked. "To get to the mouse, one must first find the cheese…and the cheese has recently begun his sixth year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry."

"There's no way that Dumbledore is going to allow any of us to question Harry Potter," Warrington challenged. "Harry has already been tested with Veritaserum and passed with flying colors. We're not going to be allowed within fifty feet of him."

Fudge's thin lips curled up into a smile that on anyone else might have been attractive; on him it merely looked like a contemptuous sneer. "You, perhaps not. However there is one amongst our staff who can." Fudge pressed a red button on his desk. "Andrea, send in the young Weasley."

The door to Fudge's office opened and a nervous looking Percy Weasley stepped into the room. He had no idea what he was doing there. He just knew that his boss had summoned him from a fascinating meeting on the specifications for the newest potion vials to advise him of something important and he wasn't about to miss that!

Percy was quite honestly a bit surprised that several highly decorated Aurors occupied Fudge's office. What were they doing here and what did they have to do with Percy?

"You summoned me sir?" Percy asked, his voice an octave higher than he would have liked. The incident with the coffee was still fresh in his mind and Percy looked to the empty mug cautiously.

Fudge smiled at Percy; a fake smile that didn't reach his eyes. "Young Weasley," he said brightly, "I've taken note of all the hard work that you do here at the Ministry. Your tireless efforts in the promotion of continuity of cauldron bottom thickness haven't gone unnoticed by this employer," he complimented. "Congratulations, Percy, on a job well done."

Percy blushed scarlet. "Thank you, sir," he gushed taking the proffered hand in his own and shaking it. Just wait until my moronic brothers hear about _this, _he thought with no false modesty. That will teach them to take my job a little bit more seriously!

"I'm of the understanding, young Mr. Weasley that you're looking for a little extra money for a Christmas gift for a certain Reference Librarian downstairs?"

"Why y--yes, sir. How did you know that?"

"How I know is really no concern of yours," Fudge said simply. "You've chosen well in Penelope Clearwater. Lovely girl, if you ask me. You know, Percy--" he paused. "Can I _call_ you Percy_?_" he asked. Without waiting for an answer from the young man (who was nearly wetting himself with delight. _Fudge knew his name!), _Fudge continued to talk. "You're going to want to buy her the very best, and the very best is costly. How would you like to do some top-secret work for the Ministry for let's say _one thousand Galleons_?"

"Of course I would!" Percy was on cloud nine. He hadn't been so pleased with life since the day he found out he was to be Head Boy at Hogwarts.

The Minister of Magic beamed at his protégé. This was going to be too easy. "Let me fill you in on the plan, Mr. Weasley…"


	5. Chapter Five

**__**

The Devil's Dilemma

Chapter Five

"Revelations, Theories and Predictions"

"_In the dark of the night evil will find her,_

In the dark of the night just before dawn

Revenge will be sweet

When the curse is complete

In the dark of the night she'll be gone!

--"In the Dark of the Night," from the motion picture, "Anastasia"

It wasn't easy being an outcast at Hogwarts, Harry thought with immense sadness. Over the first several days at the school, Harry had grown accustomed to taking meals with only Ron and Hermione; he was still getting used to being either snubbed by other Gryffindors, Ravenclaws and Hufflepuffs or teased mercilessly by the Slytherins. The days at Hogwarts crawled by so slowly that Harry could have sworn that time was going backwards.

He could not remember a time when he had so much homework to do. Professor Sprout had assigned a presentation project involving Venus Flytraps. Professor Trelawney's project with the dowsing was due in mere days and Harry hadn't even started it yet. Quidditch trials were looming on the horizon and Harry hadn't even been able to practice his moves because he had to be home with Tessa and the baby in the evening. More than once the cry of his baby daughter had torn his attention away from his Firebolt in the corner of the family room and his dreams of Quidditch glory.

Professor McGonagall and Professor Snape had assigned a cross-specialty assignment and wanted a ten-foot parchment on the hazards of Animagus Transformation (complete with a list of the most popular antidotes for the treatment of those Animagi transformations that went horribly awry and how to prepare each of them). Everyone in Harry's class had groaned when they learned of the project, but neither McGonagall nor Snape offered to budge. In fact, Snape seemed to take a certain delight in telling Harry that a detention would be assigned for each day said project was late, if that indeed became the case. After class, he had kept the extremely fatigued Harry behind after all the other students left.

"You were late to class this morning, Mr. Potter." The professor glared at Harry with a look of pure hatred.

"I'm sorry sir," Harry answered. "My daughter was up most of the night with a cold and, when I was finally able to get to sleep, I overslept; I also Apparated to the wrong location." He looked at the floor, the tips of his ears red. "It won't happen again, Professor."

Snape was unmoved. "You might think that your recent behavior with the opposite sex and the consequences resulting therein may entitle you to certain privileges concerning your homework and when you choose to turn it in, Mr. Potter," Snape said in an oily voice. "Privileges that do not extend to your classmates, perhaps?"

"Huh?" Harry asked, not quite understanding the statement.

Snape rolled his eyes. "Do not for a moment entertain the thought that, just because you have a mealy-mouthed brat to take care of now, your homework can be late, or that you can just traipse in here anytime you wish. I will still assign you a detention, regardless of how little sleep you had the night before, or any other excuse you might chose to employ!"

"I wouldn't expect you to, sir," Harry said softly. His face grew hot under the Potion Master's stare. He willed himself not to blush, but it didn't help.

"How I longed to see the day that the celebrity Harry Potter finally fell from grace," Snape continued with an almost dreamlike expression. "I remember the first year you were here, Potter. You strutted around this school like you owned the place and the world owed you a favor, just because you were James' offspring." Snape scowled at the young man in front of him. "Despite what you may think, it is only a matter of time before others see in you what I have seen all along--that you're no higher or mightier than the rest of us!"

Harry opened his mouth to rebuff Snape's comments but, at that precise moment, Hermione and Ron called to him. He was going to be late for Herbology if he didn't get a move on. Harry left the Potions classroom in a hurry, keenly aware that the beetle-black eyes of his least favorite teacher were boring into his back.

Harry honestly felt that he could handle any unpleasantness that he endured at Hogwarts as long as he focused himself on the faces of his daughter and wife, but even that had become useless as of late. Abigail had picked up a cold and had kept the young family awake for most of the previous night with her sneezing and temperature. Tessa had fretted over the child constantly. She made sure that the room was free of drafts and would only let Harry hold the little girl provided he washed his hands first.

The evening began well enough. Harry Apparated home and entered the house via the kitchen. He lifted the lid on the biscuit jar in the kitchen and smiled appreciatively. Tessa had made peanut butter biscuits and, judging by their softness and warmness, they had only recently come out of the oven. He reached for one and took a large bite. Ahh, he thought, they were almost better than sex.

Almost.

Still in his Hogwart's robes, Harry walked up the stairs and peeked into the nursery. He gazed at mother and child from across the room. Tessa and the baby were completely oblivious to his presence; she had the child to her breast now, and was singing softly to Abigail:

__

"Come, Josephine in her flying machine and it's up, she goes…up she goes…

__

Balance yourself like a bird on a beam, in the air she goes; there she goes!  
Up, up, a little bit higher. Oh, my! The moon is on fire--  
Come, Josephine in my flying machine,  
Going up, all on, "Goodbye!"

Both looked so content, so peaceful, as they sat together in the large rocking chair that Dumbledore insisted that they have. It was too big for his office, he had said. It may as well go to some good use. So, he had given it to Harry and Tessa to use in the nursery.

Harry continued to watch the peaceful scene in front of him. Tessa carried on singing in her beautiful alto voice to the little girl in her arms. Harry noticed, with some amusement, that Abigail stared at her mother intently as Tessa sang. It was almost as if Abigail really _did_ understand the words to the song!

I wonder, Harry thought, if Abigail will ever know and truly understand how loved she is? She has a mother and a father who would lay down their lives in a heartbeat for her. Of course, most parents never had to make that sacrifice but, unfortunately, if things worked out the way they normally do for me, I may very well have to make the sacrifice for her someday. Despite this depressing thought, Harry smiled and sighed as he took in the sight of the two people he cared about most in the world before him. 

His sigh caught Tessa's attention. She looked up at him and smiled. "Hello, Daddy!" she whispered, adjusting her dressing gown so that she was properly covered. Immediately Abigail gave a whimper of protest. She raised her little hand and pulled at the offending clothing.

"Hey, I was enjoying that view," Harry said with a mischievous smile.

Tessa sighed as Abigail began to nurse again. "You must be going through a growth spurt, Abbey! Mummy is tired and wants to go to sleep. Don't you?" she asked her daughter.

Tessa could have sworn she saw the child scowl.

Harry walked across the room and brushed Tessa's forehead with a quick kiss. "So, Abbey Rose has been a piglet today, eh?" he said as he offered the baby a finger to grab hold of. He never tired of feeling her tiny fingers gripping his much larger one. The child was so strong. She does come from good stock, he praised himself.

"How was school today?" Tessa asked him softly, so as not to disturb the baby.

Harry shook his head and rolled his eyes. "Don't ask. Stupid old Snape and McGonagall have decided to make my life a miserable Hell! They want a ten-foot parchment on Animagus transformations and the potions necessary to reverse any adverse affects of the change on the human body. It's due in a week!"

"I remember that project like it was yesterday," Tessa offered. "They haven't changed their curriculum in quite some time, it seems."

"Do you still have your project lying around?" Harry asked hopefully.

Tessa shook her head in the negative. "You wouldn't want it even if I did, Harry. Potions was my worst class. I remember that my parchment was full of red marks. Although," she said with a smile, "the Transfiguration portion of the assignment was excellent."

Harry untied his robes and shrugged them off. He put his arms around Tessa and nuzzled her neck.

"I missed you today, Mrs. Potter."

"And I you, Mr. Potter, but Abigail was here to keep me company."

"And what good company she is," Harry said. "Did she sleep for you today?"

"A little. Mostly just ate and pooped," Tessa said to him.

"Eurgh," Harry shuddered. His terrible day at school aside, maybe being at Hogwarts all day was a good thing. "Well, I'm glad I wasn't here for that. Honestly, I've never seen anything that can poop as much as this kid does; that includes Hagrid's Blast Ended Skrewts."

Tessa laughed.

"Can I hold her?" Harry asked.

"Wash your hands first. I don't want her getting any more germs. Who knows where your hands have been all day," she said pointedly, casting an accusatory glance at the body parts in question, as she nursed Abigail.

Her husband shot her a mildly affronted look. "They were attached to my arms, Tessa," Harry retorted. He left the room and stepped into the bathroom across the hallway. As he lathered the offending appendages, he commented, "Babies have to be exposed to things like germs eventually, you know. It'll make her stronger!"

"Typical man reaction," Tessa grumbled in a low voice. "Why don't we just throw her into the lake, because eventually she'll need to learn how to _swim_?" she added in a voice a bit louder than she had anticipated. Harry heard her.

"Great idea! And the fact that she'll very likely drown if she doesn't learn to swim quickly is only incentive," he called back dryly.

"I can't believe you just said that, Harry James Potter!"

"It's no worse than what you just said about throwing her in the lake! Honestly, woman!" he cried. There was no answer from Tessa. Harry sighed. For a few minutes things had been normal and easy. Lately, it seemed like all they ever did was bicker. He dried his hands and walked across the hall.

"Can I have her now? She wants her daddy. I can tell. See? She's looking at me," Harry said as he held out his clean hands for inspection.

As Harry said this, the child began to squirm against Tessa. Screwing up her little pink face, the baby drew her fists to her chest and began to wail.

Tessa sighed. "Why don't you take Abigail for a few minutes, Harry? I'm dying for a glass of water."

"All right," he said eagerly.

Tessa lifted the crying, nearly three-month old child to her father. Harry gently placed her over his shoulder. He rubbed Abigail's tiny back with a careful circular motion.

"I will buy you a racing broom if you stop crying," Harry whispered softly into Abigail's ear.

Immediately the baby grew quiet and content. Lifting her fist to her mouth, the only sound the couple could hear coming from Abigail's mouth was a sucking sound. Harry gave a wide smile as he sat down in the rocking chair.

"How do you get that child to calm so fast?" Tessa said in disbelief. "I couldn't do that if I lived to be a hundred."

"I don't know. I'm just popular with babies, I suppose," Harry answered. "Good girl," he whispered to Abigail.

"Well, at least this particular baby," Tessa said with a smile as she gestured in Abigail's direction. She shook her head as she left the room, quite unaware that Harry was staring at her departing figurewith desire burning brightly in his eyes.

As she descended the stairs to the kitchen, Tessa smiled. She had a handsome husband who loved her with all his heart, a beautiful little home in the country with a picket fence and a child that was precious and dear. If she were not a virtual prisoner, things would be just perfect, she thought.

Tessa stepped to the refrigerator, opened the door and pulled out a jug of water. She laughed as she heard Harry upstairs, trying to sing Abigail a song. Something about Quidditch, from what words she could make out. He tried to hit a high note and the pitch fell horribly flat. She cringed, knowing full well that Harry had no idea how bad he sounded. Tone-deaf people never did. The music teacher in her wanted to correct him; the lover in her said no.

__

CRASH!

Tessa's head snapped up from her water glass. What was that crash? "Harry!" Tessa cried. "Are you all right?"

There was no answer from upstairs. She heard a bumping sound that sounded like footfalls, followed by a thump and the howl of her child.

In that moment, Tessa's vision clouded and a wave of dizziness and deja-vu washed over her. She was dimly aware of her drinking glass leaving her fingers and crashing to the floor. The sound of shattered crystal against the tiles was far away and sounded like it was being made underwater.

__

The dream of so many months ago was becoming a reality. She could see blood…lots of blood pooling around a helpless Harry…a slash to the throat, the knife cut looking like a grotesque and taunting smile. She saw herself on the floor by his side, cradling his lifeless body in her arms. The pretty white curtains surrounding the open window behind him billowed innocently--stark purity against an evil black sky. Abigail was nowhere to be seen. As she watched the scene unfold, Tessa heard a voice to her right…squeaky and familiar…

"Listen to me T--Tessa…I show you what has the potential to be ch--changed…"

Tessa turned sharply in the direction of the voice and saw nothing. "Wormtail?" she asked in a small voice. She took another tentative step toward the Tessa-Who-Was-Not, still looking around the room. "Wormtail? Are you here?"

The doppelganger Tessa looked up from Harry's lifeless body then, straight into the real Tessa's face. A sinister smile spread slowly across its face. Tessa watched in mute horror as the thing opened its mouth and spoke, but the voice was not hers; it was eerie and cold, without pity:

"The Dreamfaster cannot help you, cursed bitch!" The being gestured towards the now-lifeless body of the savior of the Wizarding world. "You thought you could save him from the most powerful being on Earth, Tessa. Pitiable wards and silly spells won't keep me away…I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end…I always win. I ALWAYS WIN!"

In horror, Tessa watched as the Tessa-who-was-not reached up to its face and placed its fingers in the corners of its eyes. The doppelganger suddenly dug fiercely at the face, causing Tessa to cry out in alarm. Skin and sinew, chunks of flesh and bone fell away from the face to reveal two red eyes. Two very red, very evil eyes…a snake-like face with a mouth that was wide--too wide for a normal face…

The Dark Lord was here.

Tessa screamed and her vision cleared immediately. She was still in the kitchen. Her glass lay in pieces on the floor and the jug had overturned. Cold water covered the floor. With dismay, she saw that her feet were wet. She hadn't even felt the liquid against her flesh. Her heart felt like it was in her throat and she fought to draw breath as she raced up the stairs two at a time. "Harry! Harry, are you all right?" She burst through the door of the nursery.

Abigail was in her cradle crying. Harry was crouched near the far wall in the nursery, grasping one hand in the other, his eyes closed in pain. Tessa raced to his side. She looked to the floor and saw a print in jagged pieces on the floor. A few drops of bright red blood clung to one particularly sharp shard of glass.

"Honey, you've cut your hand," Tessa said in a gentle voice. She placed her fingers around Harry's wrist and turned his palm up so that it faced her. A fairly deep cut crossed his palm.

"Thanks for the news update, Tessa," Harry said with a grimace. "I was being careful, but I somehow managed to slice it on this mirror," he gestured to the ground.

Let me get a cool cloth to wrap around that wound, sweetie," Tessa offered. She left the room, hurriedly ran a washcloth under the tap to wet it and walked back into the nursery. As she wrapped his hand in it she looked to the shards of glass and then to the wall.

"I can't imagine how that mirror fell to the ground like that," Tessa said in a slightly uneasy voice. "It's been a solid fixture on the wall since before we even came here," she voiced. She walked over to the wall and inspected it closely. She placed one hand against the wall's smooth pink surface and rapped on it. The wall seemed very solid, as it should have been. What was most curious to Tessa was the placement of the nails: they had not come out of the wall in the fall and were still as straight and as solid as they ever had been. A cold feeling seeped into Tessa's very being.

"We were really lucky, I suppose," Harry said as he too inspected the wall. "It happened so suddenly. Had Abigail and I been sitting two feet closer to the wall, that heavy mirror would have crashed on us."

"I'm glad you're both okay," Tessa said as she allowed Harry to embrace her. Harry thinks this was a simple accident and perhaps he's right. Still, I am not wholly convinced that's all it was, she thought.

Her mind drifted back to the vision she had experienced in the kitchen. She had dreamed all of this before, with slight variations in events and she knew it. A large fear was beginning to be recognized to her: Voldemort intended to kill Harry and take Abigail and he would stop at nothing to ensure the plans' successes.

Later that evening, after Abigail had settled down for the night, Tessa went to Harry, waking him from a sound sleep in the way that only a wife could. Her fingers were warm against the smooth, unmarked flesh of his chest, her lips a searing heat against the spot on his neck that fluttered with his steady pulse.

Harry raised a sleepy hand and ran it through her hair. She sighed at his touch and took his hand in hers. She kissed the palm and leaned into him; her lips pressed against his, softly at first, then with more urgency. Harry helped her to slip off her thin cotton nightdress and ran his hands over her silky soft shoulders.

What followed next was a very tender joining of flesh. No words were spoken between them during the physical act: none were necessary. Each seemed to know what the other needed that night and was determined to see to it that the other's needs were fulfilled.

After the lovemaking, Harry laid on his left side with Tessa in front of him so that they resembled spoons. His arm was draped over her hip and her hands were pillowed against her cheek. Both seemed fairly content.

"Harry?"

"Yeah?"

"We really _are _safe here, right?" Tessa asked.

"Of course we are, honey," Harry said in a reassuring voice. "Dumbledore knows what he's doing. If he thought for a moment that we were unsafe here, he would move us." Harry stroked her hair. The movement of his hands through her brown tresses was almost hypnotic and Tessa closed her eyes.

"I suppose he would at that," Tessa acknowledged. "I just have a bad feeling that we're not as safe as he might think we are."

"What makes you say that?"

Tessa opened her eyes. She bit her lip, debating what she should say. "Harry, you saw the mirror this afternoon. I have a hard time believing that it fell from the wall purely by accident…I think it was meant to be a warning of sorts."

"A warning, you say? From whom, Tessa? Voldemort? He doesn't strike me as the type of wizard who leaves any sort of a warning before he attacks."

"That's true," Tessa said softly, "but maybe someone close to him is." Tessa rolled onto her back. "I just don't feel wholly secure. Something's going to happen; I can feel it." She rubbed her arms and took a deep breath.

Harry propped himself up on one arm and stroked her cheek. "I promised that I would keep you safe when I married you, Tessa, and I am sticking by that promise. You have no reason to be worried or scared anymore, sweetheart." He placed a kiss on her shoulder. "I will keep you safe. I would die before I let anyone hurt you. You and Abigail are worth protecting, Tessa." He smiled at her.

Somehow, Tessa thought, Harry always knew the right words to say. "I don't deserve someone like you, Harry," she stated. "I am so sorry for everything."

Harry didn't answer her as he lay quietly beside her. He was tired of apologies from Tessa. He wanted answers to his questions about her dreams. Several times in the last week, she had awakened from these awful visions crying and sweating. Sometimes she spoke in her sleep, but her words were garbled and incoherent. Sometimes she clung to Harry, her fingernails digging into his back, and one time she had actually pushed him away and sworn at him. That night terror had been the worst yet. Maddeningly, Tessa still refused to divulge the dreams.

As he listened to Tessa's steady breathing, Harry wondered just how long his married life was going to continue on the track it was on. He didn't want to be at school because he was an outcast, yet he didn't want to be home because his wife was behaving like she was a card short of a full deck. He didn't know what to do for the best.

And it tired him.

"Ron, as much as I hate to say this, and believe me when I say I do, we _really_ need to start this assignment of Trelawney's," Harry said as he picked up his L-rods from the ground. "I don't want to have to take this home tonight; I'll never get it done," he added.

Ron rolled his eyes as he picked up a smooth round stone and attempted to skip it across the moat. The rock skipped twice, then fell beneath the water's surface with a '_plink'_.

"That wrinkled old bat Trelawney is a menace. Honestly, to give us homework on what has to be the most perfect day of the year! It makes me want to—"

Harry laughed as he raised a hand in the air, palm out, facing Ron. "Um, Ron? Trelawney assigned this nearly a week ago."

"You're missing the point, Harry! She knows us too well: she knew that we would wait until the last minute to do this. She can probably predict the weather, too. Therefore, technically, this is all her fault."

"It's _her_ fault that _we_ waited?" Harry asked with a placid smile. Ron looked to his best friend with a frown.

At Harry's statement, Hermione's head popped out of the book she was reading. A smile spread across her face as, for the first time in her life, she heard Harry express an interest in actually completing his homework without her prodding.

"Gah," Ron sputtered, unable to completely digest what his friend had just said. "That's _Hermione_ logic, Harry!"

Harry laughed.

The two friends stood underneath a spreading oak tree, next to the great moat that surrounded Hogwarts castle, skipping stones across its murky surface. Hermione lay on her stomach in the tree's shade, studying text from her Ancient Runes book. It was late in the afternoon, after the last classes of the day had finished, and both boys felt the need to burn off a little energy. Hermione had pooh-poohed the idea of going outside, protesting that the library would be a better place to get work done efficiently, but had closed her mouth when both boys shot her glares.

Harry and Ron's original plan was to work on broomstick maneuvers on the pitch. However, the Quidditch area was already booked for a practice by the newly-chosen Hufflepuff team, so the boys' idea of soaring through the air was out of the question. Hogsmeade wasn't an option either, so they decided to camp out underneath a tree and just relax.

However, people could only throw stones into the moat and annoy the giant squid for so long before it became a trifle boring. Harry therefore decided that perhaps he should do his homework before it was too late. "This was supposed to be a partnered project, Ron. You know I have to go to Tessa tonight: she hasn't seen me since Sunday night. I can't hang around here anymore, so let's get this done."

So, we're supposed to use these rods to dowse for things, huh?" Ron asked. He looked at the sticks in his hands for a moment and then looked back at Harry. "What d'ya suppose we ought to look for?"

Harry shrugged his shoulders as he lay under the sprawling oak tree. "I don't know. Maybe treasure."

Ron set his face in an expression of grim determination. He pointed the sticks parallel to the ground and cried out, "Gold, here I come!"

Just as Ron uttered these words, a blond head appeared over a nearby knoll. It was Draco Malfoy, who was swaggering about like a proud peacock and smiling like the cat that ate the canary. He walked over to where the two boys stood, his mouth curving into a contemptuous sneer and his gray eyes flickering, as he surveyed them both.

Ron groaned. "That wasn't the gold I was looking for," he said. Harry nodded his head.

"Well, if it isn't Hogwart's newest daddy and his penniless sidekick!" Draco drawled.

Ron shot Draco a withering glare. "Hey, Malfoy, isn't there a village somewhere looking for its idiot?"

Draco chose to ignore Ron's snide comment, focusing his attention instead on the dowsing rods in Ron's hands. "What's with the sticks, Weasley? Are your parents so poor that you're trying to build your very own broom? How _creative_," he added in a condescending tone.

"Nope," said Ron. "We're dowsing."

"Dowsing? What the hell is that?" Draco asked.

"Dowsing, dimwit. We're looking for things," Harry remarked. "We're working on our Divination project, not that it's any of your business. We were told to dowse for something and write down our findings."

Ron positioned his L-rods so that they were horizontal to the ground and proceeded to walk slowly in Draco's direction. "I think I'm going to look for your brains, Malfoy!" Ron's face broke into a sarcastic smile as he stepped very close to Draco and placed the sticks over his blond head. The sticks did not cross. He looked over to Harry who was snickering. "Well Harry, what would you say?"

Harry made a show of intently studying the furious blond boy. "No evidence of a brain found: duly noting the fact onto my parchment." Harry was laughing so hard that he would later swear that he had punctured a lung. He turned away from the sight so that Draco would not see the tears of laughter that were rolling down his cheeks.

"Droll, Weasley. Very droll," Draco said dryly. To Harry, he said, "Heard from that whore you knocked up, Potter? I'll bet not. You know, by now your kid's probably been born. It's only a matter of time before the bastard is found. It'll probably be fed to wild dogs, if Fudge has his way. My father says he's going to raise the reward for her capture."

This information worried Harry. Draco's father was a heavy player in Fudge's social circle; he was on the Board of Governors for Hogwarts and, more likely than not, interacted with the Minister of Magic on a regular basis. Lucius Malfoy probably knew what he was talking about.

The sensible side of Harry wanted to ignore Draco's cutting remarks and simply get out of there, but the impulsive side wanted to rearrange Draco's face. In the end, Harry's brain opted for a compromise.

"They can raise the reward all they want Malfoy. It's pretty obvious that nobody knows where she is. If they did, they'd have turned her in already," Harry said reasonably.

"Oh, I don't know about that," Draco quipped in a self-satisfied voice. "It seems to me that if the price is right, _anyone_ will talk; even those who might have supported her decision to run away from the loony bin all those months ago." He stuffed his hands into the pockets of his robes. "Yes sir, _someone's _going to find her and she's going to get a little kiss faster than you can say 'paternity test'."

"I'll believe it when I see it," Harry said.

"Draco!" Another voice sounded from the knoll now. It was Pansy Parkinson. She wore an exhilarated expression. "Come and see! The Quidditch trial results have been posted, and you're team captain!" She motioned for him to follow her.

This apparently interested Draco a great deal and he left the trio; but not before he asked Hermione if the Department of Magical creatures had asked her to register her bushy hair in the Dangerous Animals registry. Ron scowled; Hermione merely shook her head.

He sighed as he looked at the two dowsing rods on the grass. "This project is due in tomorrow and we've done very little on it. I'm sorry, Ron." He picked up his parchment. "I find it unlikely that Professor Trelawney is going to accept 'Draco Malfoy has no brain' as our only result of dowsing."

"Make something up," suggested Hermione. "That worked wonders for you last year."

Ron smiled at his girlfriend. "I'm _shocked _that you'd say that. Absolutely shocked…and also more than a little impressed. Anything you'd especially like to find if you were dowsing, Harry?"

How about a really powerful memory charm to cast on Fudge so that he'll leave Tessa alone? Harry thought. How about looking for a place where Tessa, Abigail and I can live happily without fear of being attacked by Voldemort? "Well, lately clean nappies are a concern. Perhaps that?" he asked aloud.

Hermione snickered. "If you put _that _on your parchment tongues are going to wag!"

"Well, I don't know what to look for," Harry said. "Professor Trelawney said something about a letter in her quote unquote 'prediction' to me last week. Why don't we find that?"

Ron brightened. "Sounds good. Tell you what, I'll write it out tonight and you can buy me a butterbeer next time we're all at Hogsmeade. Deal?"

"Deal," Harry agreed.

As Harry sat in the library, he could hear the roar of the other Hogwarts students as they hurried down the corridor, heading out to Hogsmeade. The very idea saddened Harry considerably. He was forced instead to stay in the library and concentrate on his studies; Hogsmeade was merely a lovely memory now. He had a wife and child to support. He could not afford to fail out of Hogwarts.

His mind drifted back to earlier, happier days; days filled with Quidditch games, enjoying dinners in the Great Hall with Hermione and Ron; lazy weekends doing nothing but playing wizard's chess and eating Honeydukes chocolate.

As Harry stared blankly at the Potions textbook in front of him, he realized that those days were long gone. Any innocence he might have possessed once before was now wholly gone; he would never get it back. His life was to be doomed to changing nappies and dealing with a wife that he was beginning to think may very well be one Unforgivable short of life-time banishment to St. Mungo's.

It was at this point in Harry's bout with self-pity that the door to the library opened and Hermione and Ron stepped in, hand in hand. They approached Harry's table and he pretended to be extremely interested in his quill. He knew what they were going to say…he had already heard it from Hannah Abbot, Justin Finch-Fletchley, Colin Creevy, and Cho Chang. Cho had been especially insistent that he take some time to go to Hogsmeade. She had even suggested they go as a couple.

"Harry," Cho pouted, "all work and no play makes you a very dull boy!"

Harry merely shook his head politely at her and remained steadfast to his idea that he was going to complete his homework.

"I'll bring you back some lemon drops. How about that?" Cho asked.

"Yeah, that's fine, thanks," Harry said absently without looking back up at her. Cho shook her head and left the room in a huff, obviously not used to being dismissed in such a manner.

"Harry? Are you coming to Hogsmeade with us?" a female voice asked.

Harry looked up into the expectant faces of Hermione and Ron.

"Sorry, I can't. I have to finish my Potions essay."

"You haven't finished that yet?" Hermione asked. "It was incredibly easy for me."

Harry shook his head. "Perhaps it was for you, but not for me. I'll probably have it finished by the end of the day, though. You two have a good time at Hogsmeade. Go on," he added as he looked out the window. "It looks like it's going to be a great day for the trip."

"Harry, it's not as much fun without you."

"I can't go! I have to finish my work!"

"Harry, I'm all for you doing your schoolwork and being studious, but you need a break," Hermione said in a concerned voice. "You study all the time, now--"

Harry shot Hermione a hard look. "I would have thought that of all people, Hermione, you would be happy about that," he said. "I'm taking your advice: I'm concentrating on my studies."

"I'm worried about you Harry. Ron and I both are. Take some time off and come to Hogsmeade with us today, hmm?" Hermione's face was the picture of concern.

"I can't," Harry said in a flat voice. "You two both know why. I have a wife and daughter who are depending on me to finish Hogwarts, get a job and become a productive member of society."

Ron threw up his hands. "You spend too much time with Tessa, you know that? I remember the good old days when you'd be complaining about Trelawney right by my side and then we'd just make up predictions at the last minute and laugh our arses off when our parchments came back with 'Lovely work' written on them in sparkly ink. I remember when we would sit in the Great Hall and mentally undress the girls we liked. I remember when we'd send Snape little bottles of shampoo by public owl post and how we'd laugh when he looked at the bottles like he didn't know what they were for. I remember when we used to go into Hogsmeade and drink butterbeer like it was going out of style and--" Ron stopped his tirade as he crossed his arms over his chest. "I miss my best friend. You've become too mature."

"I haven't had a lot of choice, Ron!" Harry exclaimed. "I have a family now!"

"Mr. Potter--" spoke Madame Pince in a warning tone of voice. "Keep it down!"

Harry lowered his voice. "I don't have time for anything anymore. I don't remember the last time I was able to do something just for me. I'm either changing nappies or writing an essay for Snape or Trelawney or Sprout or changing a nappy or comforting a wife who's been so distant and distraught lately and won't tell me _why_! I don't remember the last night I slept all night. I think I'm going slightly mad!"

"You said the nappy part twice," Ron pointed out.

"That's because Abigail goes through so _bloody_ many of them, I felt it was worth mentioning twice. Did you know that the average baby uses _ten _nappies every day? Let me just say that Abigail is doing her part to bring the average up! Last night I changed her and before I finished putting the nappy together she had gone again!"

"And I thought I wouldn't learn anything new today," Ron said weakly. "Too much information, Harry!"

"Babies aren't easy, Harry," Hermione spoke gently. "You're doing very well, considering…uh…the unpleasantness." She sat down and motioned for Ron to do the same.

Harry was beside himself with frustration. "Do you know that the whole of Gryffindor House still looks at me like I've sprouted two heads because I blew the Quidditch Cup for them last year? I can't even give them a _decent _excuse as to why I left the pitch. The hardest part about all of this is that I can't even _tell _people what's going on, aside from you and Hermione, and even then I haven't told you the half of what's going on. I don't want to drag you down with all the details. My life is so bogged down and difficult that sometimes I just don't want to go back to—" Harry stopped speaking and bowed his head.

"Harry," breathed Hermione. "You don't want to go back to where?"

Harry looked upward. His eyes were that of a tortured soul. "Home…to Tessa and the baby. I know that's wrong, I really do. I'm just so tired…"

"Have you talked to Tessa about this?" Ron asked.

"No," Harry answered. "It would only worry her. She's got enough worries lately without me adding one more thing. She's still having those nightmares, like the ones she had before we were married. They scare her and she refuses to sleep. Tessa will not divulge information about them. She actually told me one night that she was afraid I would leave her if she told me anything." Harry scratched his head.

"It almost seems like she feels she has something to hide." Ron looked at the floor for a moment. The tips of his ears turned a bit red as he shuffled his feet. He really didn't want to ask the next question, but it begged to be asked. "Um, do you think she's in love with someone else?" Ron asked quietly.

Harry expression of melancholy became sadder still as he remembered the wedding ring he found in the sink. Tessa's ring. She had taken it off her finger before Edward took her to the hospital. Of course, she had never mentioned the fact that it was on her finger again, but…maybe she really _was _in love with Edward and didn't want to say anything.

Harry's mind conjured up the still-painful image of walking into the house on Valentine's Day. He had some daisies in hand, a smile upon his face, and saw his bride of six weeks passionately snogging Edward McMurray, the handyman Hagrid had hired to fix things in the house before the baby was born. He remembered the look of shock and sorrow etched into her features as he cleared his throat and she turned slowly…ever so slowly around and met his gaze. It was a face he would never forget if he lived to be a hundred and the pain of the entire evening still stung. He had never mentioned the night to anyone, not even his best friend and now…

"Harry?" Ron asked quizzically.

"What? Sorry," Harry answered, "my mind was wandering."

"That's obvious. You didn't answer my question," Ron said. "Could she be in love with someone else?"

Harry had reached his breaking point. There was only so much a young wizard could take. He choked back a sob at the thought. "I don't know, Ron. I really and truly don't know."

With that statement, the floodgates of Harry's troubles burst open like a broken dam. He spilled everything to his friends—about how he loved Tessa, but she seemed like a whole other person since being in her coma; how he had caught her wrapped up in the arms of Edward, and how he had struck her out of anger. He told them about finding Tessa's wedding ring in the sink and how Tessa had not spoken of the incident even though she now wore Harry's ring on her finger. When he finished, his two best friends had contemplative looks on their faces.

"Something isn't sitting quite right with me, Harry," Hermione said. "Your story doesn't make any sense."

"Well, it's not as if I left anything out, Hermione!"

"Based on everything you've said here, I'm not so sure that Tessa took her wedding ring off willingly," Hermione declared.

"Of course she did!" Harry answered. "Edward's not a wizard…he couldn't have Imperioed her into doing it. She had to have done it on her own. Why would she do that? Because she loves Edward McMurray! Although, for the life of me, I don't know why…"

"Can I ask you a very personal question?"

"Go for it."

Hermione leaned forward and whispered the question, so not to raise the ire of Madame Pince. "Have you and Tessa--er, had sex since the baby?"

"Hermione!" Ron cried. Madame Pince threatened to throw the trio out of the library.

Harry could feel his cheeks growing hot at Hermione's query. "Why do you need to know that? Yes, we have," Harry answered shortly.

Hermione paused, deep in thought. "If Tessa no longer loved you, wouldn't it stand to reason that she wouldn't want to have sex with you? And don't you find it rather odd that she hasn't run off with Edward?"

"Hmmm…" Harry responded. "She knows she wouldn't be safe with him…at least, I would like to think she knows that. Love can be so blind sometimes…"

"I don't believe that Tessa took her ring off willingly, Harry. I would wager just about anything that Edward had something to do with it. Maybe Tessa's dreaming about him--maybe he attacked her or something. Maybe she's embarrassed to tell you. Women that are attacked generally don't want to relive the scenario by talking about it."

"Well, I suppose that's possible…" Harry remarked. "It would go a long way to explaining things. She has been extremely jumpy lately. She saw that the locks in the nursery were broken and cried for hours and hours. Maybe she still expects Edward to make a visit." Realization that Tessa may very well be acting oddly due to very real fright hit Harry like a sledgehammer. "Oh my God. That is so twisted."

"It also leads to another thought: if Tessa was as ill as she was, combined with being in labor, I find it hard to believe that she would take the time to take off her wedding ring in anticipation of leaving you for Edward. Her thoughts would be on the safety and well-being of her baby, I would think." Hermione folded her hands on the table. "Something's not adding up here."

"Wait," Ron breathed. "What about this--Edward professes his love to Tessa and she balks…he attacks her…Tessa is scared."

"Go on," Hermione urged.

Ron's face lit up as the idea presented itself to him. "He knocks her to the ground, thereby hurting her, and she becomes ill. Then he somehow pulls her ring off her finger. You said that he had a bit of a thing for her, right?"

"But why would Edward donate his own blood to save her? He knew that she was going to stay with Harry," Hermione interjected. Hermione ran a hand absently through her hair as she pondered the situation. Then, out of nowhere, she sat bolt upright. She slammed her hand down on the table. "Oh my God, it's too easy," she cried.

"OUT!" shouted Madame Pince.

"What's too easy?" Harry asked once the trio was out of the library and heading down the corridors toward the Gryffindor common room.

Hermione plunged ahead with her explanation, speaking quickly and jumping from idea to idea. "He takes Tessa's ring off of her finger out of anger. He has professed his love to her, but she spurns him. But then, Edward gets scared: Tessa's on the floor, possibly dying, and he knows that you know that he loves her." Hermione turned to Harry and placed a hand on his shoulder. "Edward donates the blood because he loves her," Hermione whispered. "He thinks that by saving Tessa's life, she may learn to love him and leave you."

"Meanwhile, he bides his time, allowing Tessa to build up in her mind a horrible scenario of what might happen if she tells me what was going on that day. He knows that she's going to be afraid to tell me because the last time she had an interaction with him I slapped her and proceeded to rape her for all intents and purposes," Harry spoke sadly.

Hermione looked at Harry with a horrified expression. "You did _what_?" Ron took her hand and shook his head at her.

"Later," he mouthed to her. "Leaving Edward in a position to make her life a living, breathing Hell," Ron said. "Brilliant plan. Nasty and sick, but brilliant," Ron said in a louder voice.

"I think I know the solution to your problem, Harry," Hermione said, a thoughtful expression on her face. "The time has come for you to pay a visit to the handyman."

"But if Tessa finds out, she'll kill me for sure," Harry whispered.

"If you don't find out and she's not willing to tell you anything, you'll start wishing you _were _dead," Hermione pointed out. "Hagrid would know Edward's whereabouts. Let's talk to him," she suggested.

"If she's in love with him—" Harry began. He couldn't finish the sentence. It was too painful to even contemplate.

"Harry, you have to find out now rather than later. This is eating you alive," Ron said. "Besides, if we have the details of the fourth of June straight in our heads, she doesn't love him at all. Wouldn't you rather know?"

Harry pondered this. He supposed he would at that. He _did _want to know exactly what had taken place the morning that Tessa had gone into labor. Had Edward attacked her? Was that the root of Tessa's problems? "All right," he agreed. "Let's go see Hagrid."

As the trio made their way down the corridor, to the stairs that would lead out of the school and to Hagrid's hut, the Headmaster stopped them. His expression was unreadable.

"Harry, could I speak with you for a few moments?" he asked. The young wizard nodded and stepped to Dumbledore's side.

"I'll see you two in the Gryffindor common room in a little bit. Don't do anything without me," Harry advised his friends. They nodded in agreement.

Together, the old man and the young wizard walked away from Ron and Hermione. For ten minutes or more, neither spoke.

"Are you glad to be back in school? I trust your summer has been well; that is, after the events surrounding the week of the fourth of June?" Dumbledore asked.

"The summer was all right, I suppose," Harry answered half-heartedly. "As odd as this may sound, I think that being back in school is a bit of a break."

Dumbledore nodded and smiled. "It doesn't sound as odd as you might think, Harry. I suppose that for you it must be, in a way." He lowered his voice and leaned in closer to the Wizarding world's Wonder Boy. "How are Tessa and Abigail?"

Harry looked over his shoulder to make sure that nobody was around. "Abigail is wonderful, sir. She's so beautiful. I am honestly shocked that I helped in the creation of something as amazing as she is. She's everything I dreamed she would be, with the possible exception of an ungodly number of nappies and her propensity to not sleep for longer than three hours at a time. Other than that," he said as he stood a little taller, "she's a chip off the old block." Harry beamed with pride.

"And Tessa? How is she, Harry?" Dumbledore asked.

Harry reddened. "Ah, well, she's…she's…" She's something else, that's what she is, Harry thought. "She's all right, I suppose. She's not sleeping too well lately, but hopefully sleepless nights will be a thing of the past soon."

Dumbledore concurred. "She seems like she's acting like a typical mother. She's probably constantly worrying about her little girl."

No, thought Harry, she's a little more off her nut than that. He did not say this aloud, but Dumbledore sensed the pause in his voice. Sensing that perhaps there was more to Harry's situation than the young man was willing to let on, Dumbledore said, "Is there anything you wish to talk about, Harry?"

"No," Harry said, looking away. "Everything's fine."

There was a large pause, as the Headmaster seemed to gather his thoughts. Finally, Dumbledore opened his mouth. "Harry, we have a bit of a problem."

Harry stopped where he was and looked into the eyes of the Headmaster. His heart sank into his shoes. "What's the matter, sir?"

"A contact I have at the Ministry has informed me that employees in the Department of Magical Births made a discovery a few days ago that they shouldn't have, Harry. The secret of your double life is most likely going to come out very, very soon." He shook his head as he placed a comforting hand on Harry's shoulder. "I'm sorry, son. While I placed protective wards around your home and did my best to ensure that you and Tessa would never be found out, I honestly forgot about the quill. In my desperation to save your family from Voldemort and Fudge, I completely neglected to consider the matter of the quill in the Department of Magical Births."

"What is so important about the quill?" asked Harry.

"Harry, the Department of Magical Births employs a special enchanted quill which records the names of all the wizarding babies born in the world. Because Abigail is a witch, her name was recorded in the Magical Register. Parent's names are written in as well and that is where the trouble came about."

Harry paled. "Does Minster Fudge have any idea where Tessa and Abigail are?" he asked weakly.

"Well, there seems to be good news on that front: the wards around your house are, in part, concealing charms. While the Quill was able to accurately identify you and Tessa as Abigail's parents, it failed to locate your home. So, as of now, Cornelius Fudge, or anyone else for that matter, who wishes you harm cannot possibly know your family's whereabouts."

Harry sighed in relief. "That's one good thing," he said. "But now Fudge knows that I am married, it's only a matter of time before he comes after me, sir. If he tests me with Veritaserum…" Harry trailed off. The rest of his sentence really wasn't necessary: both knew what the repercussions of that would be.

"To completely refuse Fudge entry onto Hogwart's grounds puts me in a precarious position, Harry. Suspicions are going to run rampant if I do not at least allow his presence here. However, I will assure you that you will never be alone with Fudge," Dumbledore promised. He scratched his chin. "He _is _going to want to question you, however. You must warn Tessa of all this. Be prepared to leave Staplehurst at a moment's notice." Dumbledore's eyes darkened. "I don't think I have to tell you how grave the consequences of Tessa's discovery would be for her, Harry. She is a fugitive in the eyes of the Ministry."

Harry's eyes darkened. "They're never going to leave her alone, are they…Fudge and all of them? She's going to be confined to a house for the rest of her life, isn't she?" Harry looked to the ground. "Take this in the way it's meant, sir, but she would have been better in Azkaban. At least after the kiss she would have no soul," he said in a soft voice.

"Harry! What a terrible thing to say about your _wife_!"

"I don't mean it unkindly, sir. What I mean is that, if she's confined forever, she's always going to know what's out there--what she can't have. Eventually, she's going to resent me, sir, for being able to leave the house and experience the world. She's going to resent living vicariously through me. I don't want her to have to go through this until she's ninety and senile! If she got kissed before all this mess started, she wouldn't know any better anymore. To me personally, that would be a comfort."

Dumbledore was aghast. "She's _not _going to be imprisoned forever, Harry."

"Can you guarantee that? Can you stand before me and tell me with one hundred percent confidence that she's going to be able to walk into Madame Malkin's one day soon and buy a new set of robes?" Harry's voice rose. "Can you tell me for certain that I'm going to be able to take her on a proper honeymoon? _Can you?"_

Dumbledore sighed. He looked at his young charge over his spectacles. "I have to believe that she's going to be exonerated, Harry, for your sake. I just don't know when. If I did, I'd be a true Seer."

"I don't know how I am going to tell her this. It's going to rip her apart. She's already a bit tetchy about being in the house all the time; to tell her that it's going to be for a lot longer is going to send her over the edge. She's emotionally frail lately as it is!"

Dumbledore's heart broke for his student. "I know I've said this to you before, Harry, but you're shouldering a grown wizard's burden and you're doing a wonderful job. You have chosen a tough path and I have to harbor the hope that things will work out for you in the way that you deserve. Many men older than you would be broken, but you're not. Let's not worry about things in terms of forever just yet. Please go home to Tessa tonight, Harry. Tell her what I've told you. Tell her to be in readiness."

With those words, Dumbledore walked away from Harry who merely stood in the corridor for a long time afterwards, pondering the Headmaster's words. It was a full fifteen minutes before he returned to Hermione and Ron, who were in the Gryffindor Common Room playing wizard's chess. Ron was very clearly winning; Hermione only had her king and a pawn left on the board and Ron's pieces were doing celebratory dances of victory.

"Ron, I need to get to Tessa right away," Harry said. "Professor Dumbledore just gave me some news that I need to share with her."

"But we were going to see--" Hermione started.

"Sorry, Hermione, but I have to get going. See you later," Harry said as he walked off.

When he was safely out of earshot, Hermione picked up her books and stood next to Ron. She stared in the direction that Harry had left.

"I wonder what Dumbledore told Harry?" she asked. "It must have been very important for him to leave in such a hurry. Did you see how pale he looked?"

Ron raked his fingers through his bright red hair. "I have a feeling that _pale_ is going to beHarry's look for quite a long time." He took Hermione's hand. "Do you get the feeling that Harry's not giving us the full story of what's going on with Tessa and him?"

"I do, actually, and I wonder if he's embarrassed about something; or is it that he doesn't want us to know too much in case we happened to be questioned?" Hermione pondered.

Ron thought about it for a moment. "I think, Hermione, that it's a little from both columns."

"He's not going to tell if pressed either, is he?" Hermione prodded.

"No, I really don't think that he is," Ron said. He squeezed Hermione's hand. "Why don't we go back to the Main Hall and grab some dinner?"


End file.
